Registration delay of pvt vehicles to attract fine of 300/month, Rs500/m for commercial vehicles

The Centre on Tuesday announced that the renewal of registration of vehicles over 15 years old is all set to be a very expensive affair from April 2022. The Centre announced to hike the renewal fees of such vehicles by eight times and introduced a penalty clause for the delay.

The renewal registration of a 15-year-old car will cost  Rs5,000 compared to the existing Rs600. The charges for registration renewal of old bikes would be Rs1,000 compared to the current Rs300.

For a 15-year-old or more bus or truck, the owner will have to pay a fee of Rs12,500 compared to the current rate of Rs1,500, said a notification by the Road Transport and Highways Ministry.

Further, any delay in renewing the registration of private vehicles would attract a penalty of Rs300 per month and Rs500 for commercial vehicles, and commercial vehicles would have to pay a daily penalty of Rs50. Owners of private vehicles need to get the registration renewed every five years after 15 years. And once a commercial vehicle attains eight years, fitness certificate renewal becomes mandatory every year.

The prime aim of  this new fee is to discourage people from keeping their old vehicles. “The Government also intend to do away with the manual system of a fitness test, as this can be manipulated or rigged,” a MoRTH official said.

This new slab notification comes with the vehicle scrapping policy as announced in this year’s annual budget which provides for fitness test after 20 years for personal vehicles, while commercial vehicles would require it after the completion of 15 years. As per MoRTH research, old vehicles are estimated to cause 10-12 times more pollution than the latest vehicles.

To contain vehicle-related pollution, the Government had earlier announced to impose green tax on old polluting vehicles. While vehicles like strong hybrids, electric vehicles and those running on alternative fuels like CNG, ethanol and LPG will be exempted.