NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday directed that no BS-IV vehicles will be registered with the transport authorities till it decides on the issue of the sale of such vehicles during the lockdown. During a brief hearing, a bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra passed the order and asked the automobile dealers association to place before it the details of vehicles sold either online or through direct sale during the lockdown period in the last week of March.
The court said it needed to verify the details regarding the sale and registration of BS-IV vehicles during the lockdown period. According to the government’s affidavit, auto dealers have sold over eight times the sales numbers they have shown to the apex court while Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (FADA) claimed sales of 1.34 lakh BS-IV units.
The bench orally observed, “Something fraudulent might have taken place.” During the earlier hearing, the court had pulled up FADA for violating the court order. The Bench had on July 8 recalled the March 27 order by which it had allowed sale of BS-IV vehicles for 10 days across India, except in Delhi-NCR, after lifting of the COVID-19 lockdown.
The relief, which was later withdrawn, was granted to the dealers by the Supreme Court keeping in mind the fact that the country had decided not to allow their sale after March 2020. The court has now slated the next hearing for August 13. The Court had on July 24 expressed displeasure over an oral plea by FADA that dealers should be allowed to return unsold inventory of BS-IV vehicles to the manufacturers so that they could be exported to other countries. The association had said that there are some countries where sale of BS-IV compliant vehicles were still allowed. However, the Bench had said, “Why should we pass orders for that? Manufacturers were aware of the deadline.”