Delhi has seen many reforms regarding transport rules. The Government wants to tackle pollution by targeting old automobiles that do not conform to the newer and stricter emission norms.

In August this year, the Supreme Court of India accepted a proposal by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) which stated that Delhi vehicles should have colour coded stickers. Vehicles running on petrol and CNG will have a light blue sticker and those running on diesel shall have an orange sticker, with the date of registration of the Vehicle printed on the stickers. You can read the TBI report on this, here.

Close on the heels of the above proposal, comes this reform which deals with registration Number plates, and the disposal of old vehicles.

Firstly, petrol vehicles that are older than 15 years are not allowed to ply on Indian Roads, and diesel vehicles more than ten years old are not allowed to ply on Indian roads.

Secondly, if you are the owner of an old vehicle, and you want to use the numberplate on it for your new vehicle, you will have to shell out a fee of Rs 25,000, reports the Times of India.

Current rules dictate that the cost of transfer of number plate is just Rs 200. Well, the price for transfer will now be Rs 25,000 for 4-wheelers, and Rs 5,000 for 2-wheelers. However, if you have a unique number plate, that figure stands to increase exponentially.

For example, for a registration number of 0001, your fee would be Rs 50000, or 10% of the minimum reserve price for auction of the 0001 Number Plate, and for registration numbers from 0002 to 0009, will have to pay Rs 30,000, or 10% of the minimum reserve price of Rs 3 lakh. The Rs 25,000 fee will apply to other fancy number plates as well.

Well, the saying ‘Out with the old, in with the new’ is most apt for the automobile industry. As incomes rise, people are only too happy to swap out the trusty old automobiles for new ones. However, for the sake of nostalgia or practicality, if you want to keep the number plate of the outgoing vehicle, it will cost you a tidy sum!

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On a related note, the government is also looking to empanel authorised and licensed scrappers. An official with the transport department quoted in TOI explained how owners bring vehicles that are at the end stages of their lives, to the Regional Transport Office (RTO), for an inspection. Post the inspection, the old vehicle may either be turned to scrap or kept sitting at home, as court orders do not allow old vehicles to ply.

A proposal for the same is under consideration at present, and will probably be implemented soon.

Edited By:- Gayatri Mishra

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