There will be no relief for the city denizens from the hefty challaning fee levied under the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Act 2019. For, the Chandigarh Administration on Monday decided not to reduce the high traffic fines which came into effect from September 1.
Punjab Governor and UT Administrator VP Singh Badnore on Monday held a meeting with the senior officers of Chandigarh Administration to review the functioning of Transport Department and discuss the proposal related to reducing the penalties under the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Act 2019.
“After discussing the issue in the meeting, the Chandigarh Administration has decided not to reduce the hefty challaning fee and continue with the amount of traffic fines which came into effect from September 1,” said Manoj Parida, UT Adviser to Administrator while talking to The Pioneer.
He said the Administration had got representations from various quarters to reduce the heavy traffic fines. But after detailed discussion on the issue, it has been decided to continue with the new rules as it has proved to be great deterrent, Parida said.
So far, the UT Traffic Police has collected around Rs 67.5 lakh from motorists as challaning fee under various traffic violations in Chandigarh. To avoid paying heavy fines, the citizens are following the traffic rules and violations have reduced, he added.
Notably, the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Act 2019 had caused quite a stir not in the city but across the country due to exorbitant challan fee levied under it.In the union territory of Chandigarh, the UT Traffic Police had issued more than 4.000 challans under various offences in just first 10 days, collecting around Rs 14 lakh fine when the new rules were implemented.
A delegation of Chandigarh Congress, Chandigarh based NGO-ArriveSAFE among other organisations had approached the UT Administration urging it either not to impose the heavy challaning fee or bring it down under various offences in the city. From jumping the red light signal to not wearing a helmet, the challan had gone up multi-fold under the new rules. The penalty for driving without a license was increased from Rs 500 to Rs 5,000 while fine for not wearing a seatbelt now attracts a fine of Rs 1,000 as against Rs 100 earlier. The new rules had also enhanced the penalty for drunken driving to imprisonment up to 6 months and/or fine up to Rs 10,000 for first offence and imprisonment up to 2 years and/or fine of Rs 15,000 for the second offence.
Similarly, penalties for other traffic violations had seen multifold increase.
However, States namely West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, Punjab among others had put on hold the implementation of stricter fines to boost road discipline.