Rajya Sabha clears motor vehicle bill, heavy fines over rules violation
New Delhi : The Rajya Sabha on Wednesday passed a new motor vehicle bill to ensure tighter road traffic regulations and stricter punishment, including high fines for violating them.
The Upper House passed the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Bill, 2019 with 108 votes in favour and 13 against it, with three amendments moved by Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari.
The same bill was passed in Lok Sabha on July 23, but the bill will be sent back to Lok Sabha for the correction of a typo mistake.
Once the bill becomes a law, the new vehicle registration will get limited to the dealers and it will eventually remove buyers' interface with the registration authorities.
Proposals in the bill:
# Rs. 10,000 fine for not giving way to emergency vehicles and Rs. 10,000 for driving despite disqualification. Aggregators violating driving licences will be fined up to Rs. 1 lakh.
# Penalties in the range of Rs. 1,000-2,000 for speeding.
# Driving without insurance will be punishable with Rs. 2,000 fine, while driving without helmets will attract Rs. 1,000 penalty and 3-month suspension of licence.
# Parents or the guardians will be held guilty if cops find any juvenile driving the motor vehicle. As per the new provisions, "guardian/owner shall be deemed to be guilty and there will be a penalty of Rs. 25,000 with three years imprisonment and cancellation of registration of the Motor Vehicle".
# Traffic violations would now attract a penalty of Rs. 500 in place of Rs. 100 earlier, while disobedience of orders of authorities will attract a minimum penalty of Rs. 2,000 in place of Rs. 500 earlier.
# Penalty for dangerous driving would be increased to Rs. 5,000 from Rs. 1,000, while drunken driving under the proposed new law would attract a fine of Rs. 10,000.
# "If aggregators are found violating lincensing conditions, they will be charged a sum of up to Rs. 1 lakh" while overloading of vehicles would attract a penalty of Rs. 20,000.
