CHENNAI: With deadline for the sale and registration of vehicles conforming to Bharat Stage (BS)-III ending Friday, in the wake of a Supreme Court order, there was a last minute rush by owners to register their vehicles in the city.
According to transport department officials, the pace of registration witnessed a steep hike in the last two days, ever since the SC delivered the order.
“We can give the actual figure of last minute registrations only after Monday,” an official said. Clarifying a concern of last minute buyers, he said: “The Supreme Court has allowed registration of vehicles if there is proof that the vehicle had been purchased before Friday.”
He, however, added that the owner should have given details about the vehicle and completed payment on the transport department website by Friday midnight.
Across the State, a similar pattern played out. In Madurai district, sale of BS-III vehicles doubled on the last day. According to Regional Transport Office (RTO) officials, 1087 vehicles, predominantly BS-III type of vehicles, were registered as against the usual 500.
“The registered vehicles included 944 two-wheelers, 41 cars and 102 trucks,” said Madurai Central RTO K Kalyanakumar. In Madurai, the first day of the ‘discount sale’ by dealers witnessed almost 200 per cent increase in sales.
In Coimbatore, the burden of work on RTO officials increased as more vehicles than usual came for registration. “On an average, our office gets around 70 new vehicles per day for registration. But, on Thursday itself, we had made registration of around 182 new vehicles predominantly BS - III model,” said S Udhayakumar, RTO, Coimbatore (Central).
According to dealers, online registration in Transport Department website was impacted due to heavy traffic in the server. “The process for online registration took more than an hour on Friday. During normal days, it can be done within 20 minutes,” said Prakash, a two-wheeler showroom staff.
According to statistics with Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers, the unsold BS-III inventory across the country stood at 8.24 lakh with 6.71 lakh being two-wheelers. With such a huge stock remaining unsold, motor companies offered huge discounts of up to Rs 25,000 on models. The discount incentive was widely advertised.