Driving forward – Amendments to the Motor Vehicle Act

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Driving forward – Amendments to the Motor Vehicle Act

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Tightening the screws : The Lok Sabha passed the amendments to the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 to ensure enhanced road safety. These amendments have focused on use of digital technology to simplify processes and prevent fraud, encouraging people to help victims by protecting them from harassment, on easing the pressure of third party compensation on insurance companies, and increase of penalties for several offences under the 1988 Act.

Deaths : As per the National Crime Records Bureau, Ministry of Road Transport & Highway, there is one death every four minutes in India due to road accidents. In 2015, more than 1.5 lakh people were killed in road accidents, which is more than the number of casualties in all wars, put together. The government is committed to reduce the accidents and fatalities by 50% in five years.

Third party insurance liability : Under the Act of 1988, the liability of the third party insurer for vehicle accident is unlimited. However, the Bill limits the maximum liability at Rs. 10 lakh in case of death and Rs. 5 lakh in case of serious injuries. However, there is no limit the compensation amount that the courts can award. The Bill aims to amend 68 of the 223 sections of the current Motor Vehicle Act.

Deep Dive : Read more on related topic - Ban on highway liquor here

A new fund created : The provision for a Motor Vehicle Accident Fund has been made in the Bill, which would provide compulsory insurance cover to all road users in India for specific types of accidents. The Central government will determine the guidelines for taxi aggregators which have been defined in the Bill.

Other provisions : Provisions for amending the existing categories of driver licensing, recall of defective vehicles have also been made in the Bill. The Bill however, fails to address issues such as creating road safety agencies and improvement of road designs.

Parents, beware! In case of accidents committed by juveniles, the guardians/owners of vehicles shall be deemed to be guilty and the registrations of their vehicles would be cancelled. Juveniles would be tried under J J Act as provided in the Bill. Traffic violation penalties are also proposed to be increased. Stricter provisions are proposed for traffic violations such as juvenile driving, drunken driving and driving without licenses.

Fitness tests : The Bill also proposes to mandate automated fitness testing for transport vehicles with effect from October 1, 2018. This has been done to weed out corruption in the transport department. To facilitate transport solutions for Divyangs, impediments in grant of licenses and alterations in the vehicles to make them fit for their use by Divyangs have also been removed.

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