The fancy number “CH-01-AV-0001” went for whopping Rs 7.01 lakh in an open auction of new vehicular series “CH-01-AV” held on Saturday. The Registering and licensing Authority (RlA) conducted an open auction for the first time for 83 vehicle registration numbers for series ‘CH-01-AV’ at the Sector 17 office on Saturday.
Gagandeep Singh, a resident of Sector 38 here bought the fancy number “0001” for his Mitsubishi Pajero car. Surprisingly, Gagandeep, a builder by profession had come to buy fancy number “0004” with a demand draft of Rs 15,000 but ended up buying number “0001”. Gagandeep had come along with the demand draft of Rs 15,000 while to bid for “0001” a demand draft of Rs 25,000 was required. later, he had to exchange his dollars for rupees to get the prescribed amount to bid for “0001”
This time, the applicants interested in obtaining the VIP numbers had to get a demand draft of the prescribed amount in favour of the RlA. After buying the number, Gagandeep expressed surprise over the low price of the fancy number “0001” and said that I never expected to get “0001” for only Rs 7.01 lakh. I had thought the price for “0001” would go much higher and had come here to buy number “0004”. Earlier, there were only seven bidders for “0001” number and the bid had stopped at Rs 3.50 lakh.
During the open auction of 83 VIP numbers, the RlA received good response and earned Rs 47.5 lakh on Saturday. During the auction, vanity number “0002” went for Rs 2 lakh, “0003” went for Rs 2.10 lakh, “0006” received bid of Rs 2.20 lakh, “0007” went for Rs 2.60 lakh, “0008” went for Rs 1.75 lakh, “009” also received a bid of Rs 1.75 lakh and “0070” went for Rs 1.95 lakh. An open auction for registration numbers “0101” onwards will be held on October 20 from 9.30 onwards.
Till now, the RlA used to invited applications for the fancy numbers. The applicants who had applied for the fancy number during the booking period could participate in the auction. However, now anyone with a demand draft of the amount fixed as reserved price for a particular number can participate in an open auction. In the last auction held on August 2 for the CH01AU series, some bidders allegedly formed a cartel to make sure the bidding did not go high. Following this, seven numbers were cancelled by the Deputy Commissioner’s office.