Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Bill introduced in Lok Sabha

The Bill, which seeks to amend the Motor Vehicle Act, 1988, was opposed by the Trinamool Congress and the Congress.

"The Bill takes away from the power of the state government to improve rural transport infrastructure. It infringes upon the rights of the state," Trinamool's Saugata Roy said.

Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury also opposed the parts of the legislation, saying that they are against the constitutional powers of the state.

Addressing their concerns, Gadkari said that the parts of the Bill opposed by the opposition leaders does not infringes upon the rights of the states.

"The Bill was prepared after consulting 18 transport ministers from various states. It was also screened by the Parliamentary standing committee and the joint select committee. It was passed by the Lok Sabha but could not be passed in Rajya Sabha," he said.

The Union Minister said that every year around 1.5 lakh people die in road accidents and the Bill would a step ahead to save these lives.

"Around 30 per cent driving licences in the country are bogus. Getting licences in India is most easy. People have no fear of law and they do not care of the fines of Rs 50 or 100," he said.

Gadkari hailed the Tamil Nadu government for reducing the road accidents upto 15 per cent and admitted that it was failure of his department that despite several efforts it could only reduce upto 4 per cent accidents.

"We want to go ahead with the Tamil Nadu model. There is no politics in it and neither the Bill infringes upon the rights of the states. So to save the lives of lakhs of people every year, please get this Bill passed," he said.

Increasing penalties of traffic violations, addressing issues on third-party insurance, regulation of cab aggregators and road safety are among the changes proposed in the amendment.

The amendment Bill proposes to omit a clause of the Motor Vehicle Act to decide how to maintain their registers for driving licenses, to centralise vehicle registration data and achieve standardization.

It also proposes a National Transportation Policy for ushering guidelines on the transportation of goods and passengers.