CHENNAI: Tamil Nadu transport department has proposed to set up a series of registered vehicle scrapping facilities (RVSF) across the state as the deadline for de-registering government vehicles approaches.
With the new rules coming to force on April 1, heavy vehicles will need to seek fitness certificates (FC) from automated testing stations. On the other hand, all government vehicles that are older than 15 years will have to be de-registered from April 1.
As per the centre’s notification, all the overaged vehicles owned by the state government, public transport undertakings and other transport vehicles will only be condemned through the authorised vehicle scrapping facility at a nominal price. The centre attributed the decision to reducing road accidents on account of dysfunctional vehicles and also mitigating the environmental impact.
“The scrapping centres will act as the collection centre for disposing of vehicles that fail FC tests. The vehicle owner should apply for condemnation through Vahan software, and the authorised scrapping centre will be allocated accordingly,” said an official quoting the union government notification.
The technology required for conducting FC tests for establishing an automatic testing track has also been finalised. “The locations and number of automated testing centres are being finalised. A proposal to set up RVSFs has been sent to the government for approval. A policy decision on this is yet to be taken by the government,” added the official.
At present, motor vehicle inspectors assess the vehicle fitness on the testing track for issuing FC. As of December 31, 2022, the state has nearly 5.9 lakh heavy vehicles. The decision to de-register government vehicles that are older than 15 years will not have any significant impact on the state, said official sources.
The department of Tamil Nadu Motor Vehicles Maintenance is a competent body for disposing of government vehicles and it maintains 21,500 vehicles owned by the police, revenue, education, judicial, animal husbandry, forest, and other agencies.
The petrol-driven vehicles which run for 10 years or 2 lakh km in plains and 8 years or 1.6 lahks in hills can be scrapped. Diesel-driven vehicles operated for 10 years or 2.5 lakh km in plains and 8 years or 2 lakh km in hills can be condemned.
“We have commenced the work to identify the overaged vehicles as per the centre’s policy. Most of the vehicles which are 10 years old have been scrapped,” said an official from TNMVM.