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Re-registration of vehicles older than 15 years to get costlier from April 2022
Renewing registration certificates of vehicles that are older than 15 years will cost up to eight times more from April 2022, the Ministry of Road, Transport and Highway (MoRTH) said on Tuesday after it issued a notification finalising the revised rates for re-registering old vehicles and re-issuance of fitness certificates
Renewing registration certificates of vehicles that are older than 15 years will cost up to eight times more from April 2022, the Ministry of Road, Transport and Highway (MoRTH) said on Tuesday after it issued a notification finalising the revised rates for re-registering old vehicles and re-issuance of fitness certificates.
The new rates will be a part of the central government’s vehicle scrapping policy which aims to incentivise the practice of purchasing new vehicles against scrapping old ones. The policy, once it comes into effect from next year, will disincentivise vehicles that are older than 15 years by charging heavily on the renewal of their registration and fitness certificates. It is meant to encourage people to scrap their old vehicles instead of running them, which contributes to air pollution.
As per the latest notification issued by the MoRTH on Monday night, the renewal of registration of a 15-year-old car will cost ₹5,000 against the current rate of ₹600. Re-registration of two-wheelers that are older than 15 years will cost ₹1,000 from April next year, compared to the current fee of ₹300. For imported cars, the cost will be ₹40,000 against the existing fee of ₹15,000. A delay in renewing registrations for private vehicles will cost ₹300 a month and the penalty for commercial vehicles will be ₹500 per month. As per the rules, a private vehicle, once it attains 15 years, will have to be renewed every five years since then.
“As an incentive, there will be a waiver of the fee for issue of registration certificate for a new vehicle, purchased against the authority of the Certificate of Deposit (CoD) issued by a registered vehicle scrapping facility for a vehicle being scrapped,” the MoRTH said in a statement.
Coming to the renewal of fitness certificates which is required for transport and commercial vehicles, the cost for cabs will go up from ₹1,000 at present to ₹7,000 from next year. For heavy good vehicles, such as buses and trucks, the fitness fee will be ₹12,500 against the current rate of ₹1,500. A fitness certificate is mandatory for commercial vehicles once they cross 8 years.
To be sure, these rates will not be applicable in Delhi-NCR unless there are specific orders from the Supreme Court or the national green tribunal (NGT) but will apply across all states, other than Delhi.
Any registered diesel vehicle more than 10 years old, and petrol vehicles over 15 years old, cannot operate in NCR. Such vehicles cannot even be parked in public spaces. These rules have been laid down in various orders issued by the National Green Tribunal (2015) and the Supreme Court (2018).
Unlike in Delhi-NCR, the Centre’s scrapping policy is based on the principle of vehicle fitness and not driven by age of the vehicle. Every state will have to notify this policy and only after that, it will get implemented. As of now, the Centre is seeking comments from various state governments to make the policy more inclusive. It will come into force from next year.
