 "Road Safety, Motor Vehicles Bill")
It would not be incorrect to say that the government is committed to road safety, but will it manage to bring the states on board to achieve this mammoth task? The Centre, through the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Bill, 2016, plans to bring in stricter road safety laws, but the actual implementation of the new rules would lie with the states, and that is where the challenge lies.
The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has clearly spelt out the rationale behind overhauling the Motor Vehicles Act; the primary reason is road safety.
However, while the Motor Vehicles Act is a Central Act, the Bill calls for a more active role to be played by the states in implementing road safety laws. For one, it envisages setting up of a transport authority in each state. This is required to improve coordination between the Centre and the states. Currently, in the absence of such an authority, the Centre cannot undertake transport-related construction or even build bus shelters or bus stands in any city across the country.
Since road transport is in the concurrent list, the Centre has little say in how the states manage their transport system. A transport authority in each state is intended to improve the coordination between the two in road-related matters and create channels for the Centre to fund road-safety project in states.
“In the old Act, the Centre had no role other than making legislations,” says a transport ministry official.
While the Bill is currently with the Standing Committee and unlikely to be tabled in the Winter session, given the logjam in Parliament over the government’s demonetisation drive, its passage when it is eventually brought for discussion is going to be far from smooth.
Hurdles ahead
Among the many sticking points is the punitive aspect of the Bill. Many say the penalties are a “bit too harsh” and leave enough wiggle room for the traffic police to harass the common man.
According to the draft, violators of licensing rules would be penalised with fines of up to Rs 1 lakh. The Bill provides for a uniform driving licence and vehicle registration processes across states through the creation of national registers. Furthermore, if a juvenile is involved in traffic violations, the Bill makes a case for prosecuting his guardian or the owner of the vehicle. These offences will attract a penalty of Rs 25,000 along with a three-year jail term. The juvenile would be tried under the Juvenile Justice Act and the registration of the vehicle will be cancelled.
While the proposed penalties may come across as steep, an official involved in drafting the Bill says they were decided after consultations with the police department. He says the department was strongly in favour of higher penalties. As things stand today, the courier cost of sending traffic challans to offenders is higher than the penalty amount itself in most cases.
Besides focusing on making people obey traffic rules, the Bill also proposes to improve access to transport in rural areas by letting states give permits to stage and contract carriages to operate in areas where finding public transport is not easy.
Another contentious aspect of the Bill is its stand on radio taxis. It has tried to regulate app-based taxi aggregators, mainly Ola and Uber, by bringing such services under its ambit. While taxi aggregators are against any such move as they consider themselves to be technology start-ups and not transport companies, the government thinks otherwise. The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has made it clear that “whatever law applies to the kaali-peeli taxis, will apply to these taxi aggregators as well”.
While taxi aggregators have simplified the daily commute of people in cities by providing them with alternative transport services, they mainly operate in a grey legal zone as the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, does not have any provision for app-based taxi hailing services.
This legal loophole came to the fore in December 2014 when an Uber driver was charged with raping a 27-year-old woman working in Gurugram. In the wake of the incident, Uber was faulted for violating the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, by providing the commuter for local journey a taxi with an all-India permit and for not carrying out background checks for its drivers. Following this, the transport department even suspended the service briefly before restoring it later.
The inclusion of taxi aggregators in the Motor Vehicles Act has also been a long-standing demand of auto-rickshaw drivers and local cab operators who find their business model threatened by these new entrants.
Subject of the state
However, while the Bill has taken the crucial first step of laying down rules and regulations, the Centre has made it clear the bulk of the responsibility for their implementation will have to be shouldered by the states.
Officials in the transport ministry believe “implementation is a matter of governance and should be left to the states”.
Many of the states were consulted during the drafting stage of the Bill. The Road Transport Ministry constituted a group of transport ministers of states to suggest the amendments. A total of 18 transport ministers from different political parties participated in these meetings and submitted their reports.
In the present Motor Vehicle Act, there are 223 sections and the Bill aims to amend 68 of these. Also, chapter 10 of the Act has been deleted and a new chapter has been added in its place with provisions to simplify third-party insurance claims and settlement process.
The passage of this Bill was one of the promises made by Road Minister Nitin Gadkari when he took charge in May 2014. After a series of delays and deliberations, it may now see the light of the day, though only in the Budget session.
