In 3 years, 8000 vehicles booked for evading road tax

NAVI MUMBAI: The Regional Transport Office (RTO) Vashi has been tracking down all outstation vehicle owners who have not paid road tax.

The vehicles caught in the drive are those which are registered in states other than Maharashtra and are operating in the city without paying the tax.

Over 8,000 vehicles have been booked in the last three years for not paying road tax. Taxes amounting to Rs2 crore were recovered.

As per the records, a total of 2,643 such vehicles have been caught in 2015- 16 till January. For this, a total amount of Rs18.13 lakh fine and Rs60.63 lakh have been recovered in taxes.

While in 2014-15, a total of 3,416 vehicles were caught which paid a fine of Rs 26.56 lakh and Rs 89.10 lakh tax. In 2013-14, a total of 2,825 such vehicles were booked which resulted in a fine collection of Rs19.65 lakh and a tax recovery of Rs58.07 lakh.

Officials said the data collected is a total of all the vehicles that are caught and hence there is no bifurcation of the vehicles that are booked.

“As per the Motor Vehicles Act, owners of vehicles which are registered in other states have to pay road tax to Maharashtra if they are bringing it for use for more than 14 days. Mostly, the buses which constitute of 30-40 percent are the major violators of this rule,” said Sanjay Dhaygude, deputy regional transport officer, RTO Vashi.

The road tax that is paid is decided on the age of the vehicles along with which other criteria like the permit of the vehicle, seating capacity, company or private vehicles etc are considered while calculating the tax.

Officials said most people tend to save on road tax by not registering their vehicles when they move in from other states. “Most of the people avoid getting their vehicles registered here to avoid paying the tax,” said the RTO official.