On junking old vehicle, get road tax concession

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Shimla, February 13

To encourage scrapping of old vehicles, the government will offer concession on road tax at the time of the registration of the vehicle against the submission of a certificate of deposit in the state. While the rebate for non-transport vehicle has been fixed at 25 per cent, the transport vehicles will get a concession of 15 per cent.

Registered Vehicle Scrapping Facilities soon

• The government is in the middle of setting up Registered Vehicle Scrapping Facilities (RVSF) in the state to ensure optimal disposal of hazardous material and recycling
• “Outside the RVSF, scrapping is not effective. Only around 50 to 60% of the material is recovered, while in RVSF around 95% material can be recovered and is used for recycling,” an official said
• At the moment, the state doesn’t have a single RVSF. To begin with, the government is aiming to establish at least five to six RVSF

As per the notification issue by Secretary (Transport) RD Nazeem, the concession will be available up to eight years in case of transport vehicles and up to 15 years in case of non-transport vehicles.

The concession will be applicable to the non-transport vehicles at the time of first registration only. For transport vehicles, the concession will be applicable from the date of registration and on subsequent occasions when token tax is paid in accordance with the Himachal Pradesh Motor Vehicles Taxation Act, 1974.

The decision is in line with Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu’s intent to turn the state into a green energy state by 2026. “The decision is aimed at reducing vehicular pollution. Old vehicles emanate a lot of pollution, so these must be scrapped after a certain period of time,” said an official from Transport Department. “In developed countries, vehicle density is higher but the pollution from vehicles is negligible as the vehicles are scrapped promptly after a fixed time,” he added.

Besides, the government is in the middle of setting up Registered Vehicle Scrapping Facilities (RVSF) in the state to ensure optimal disposal of hazardous material and recycling. “Outside the RVSF, scrapping is not effective. Only around 50 to 60 per cent of the material is recovered, while in RVSF around 95 per cent material can be recovered and is used for recycling,” he said.

At the moment, the state doesn’t have a single RVSF. To begin with, the government is aiming to establish at least five to six RVSF. “We have received a good response to the expression of interest (EoI) we had sought for setting up these facilities,” the official said.

Meanwhile, the government has already made it mandatory for all government vehicles to be scrapped 15 years after registration.