Table of Contents
What has happened?
- Nitin Gadkari, minister of road transport and highways, has approved a new “Vehicle Scrappage Policy” to incentivize user to scrap old vehicles and buy new ones.
- The ministry released a statement;
- “The Minister approved the policy of deregistration and scrapping of vehicles owned by Government department and PSU, which are above 15 years in age. It is to be notified and will come into effect from April 1 2022.”
- The policy is to scrap vehicles which are over 15-yearson the road.
- They are not only to include private vehicles but also vehicles owned by government departments and PSU.
- The Policy notification is expected to be announced soon before being implemented from April 1, 2022.
The long journey of the policy
- Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had in August 2019 said a scrappage policy is in the works.
- On July 26, 2019, the government had proposed amendments to motor vehicle rules to allow the scrapping of vehicles older than 15 years in a bid to spur the adoption of electrical vehicles.
- In July last year, the National Green Tribunal rapped the MoRTH for the delay in issuing guidelines on the scrapping of vehicles.
- A bench headed by NGT Chairperson Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel had said,
- A proper mechanism to set up authorised recycling centres compliant with environmental norms was an urgent need in view of a large number of ‘End of Life Vehicles’ (ELV).
- Finally draft scrappage policy has been approved but details were yet to be shared in public domain by MoRTH as it has been sent to states.
Incentives for scrappage
- The policy is expected to offer incentive to motorists who decide to scrap their old vehicles.
- The incentives were expected to be a waiver of the registration fee and a discount on the road tax.
- The old vehicles would be used in recycling clusters – thereby, cutting the cost of raw materials.
Proposal to levy a “Green Tax”
- Transport vehicles older than 8 years could be charged Green Tax at the time of renewal of fitness certificate, at the rate of 10 to 25 % of road tax.
- Personal vehicles to be charged Green Tax at the time of renewal of Registration Certification after 15 years.
- Public transport vehicles, such as city buses, to be charged lower Green tax.
- Higher Green tax (50% of Road Tax) for vehicles being registered in highly polluted cities.
- Differential tax, depending on fuel (petrol/diesel) and type of vehicle.
- Vehicles like strong hybrids, electric vehicles and alternate fuels like CNG, ethanol,LPG etc to be exempted.
- Vehicles used in farming, such as tractor, harvestor, tiller etc to be
- Revenue collected from the Green Tax to be kept in a separate account and used for tackling pollution, and for States to set up state of-art facilities for emission monitoring.
Benefits of Vehicle Scrappage Policy?
- This would not only curb air pollution levels in India.
- But will in return help in posting demand for new vehicles thus helping the ailing automotive industry in India.
- Additionally, older vehicles with outdated safety features would be phased out allowing for more people to be travelling is safer modern vehicles.
- More importantly, the Indian government is also trying to reduce its oil import bill.
- Pushing for the use of electric vehicles is believed to help in reducing the amount of oil India is importing.
Why commercial vehicles are more of a concern?
- It is estimated that commercial vehicles, which constitute about 5% of the total vehicle fleet , contribute about 65-70% of total vehicular pollution.
- The older fleet, typically manufactured before the year 2000 constitute less that 1 % of the total fleet but contributes around 15% of total vehicular pollution.
- These older vehicles pollute 10-25 times more than modern vehicles.
Q) Automobile exhaust release, which of the following pollutant?
- Carbon compounds
- Sulphur compounds
- Hydro carbons
- Nitrogen compounds
- 1,2,3
- 2,3,4
- 1,3,4
- 1,2,4
Latest Burning Issues | Free PDF
WhatsApp