A human hauler without fitness moves on the road flouting traffic rules and posing threat to the people. The photo was taken at Babu Bazaar Bridge in old town of Dhaka on Wednesday.
The Bangladesh Road Transport Authority is going to cancel within this month the registration of the motor vehicles which did not have their fitness certificates renewed in the past 10 years or more.
As part of the move, the authorities have asked its all circle offices across the country to submit the list of permanently unfit motor vehicles to the head office within October 30.
Till now, the BRTA has no mechanism to cancel the registrations of permanently unfit and destroyed motor vehicles as it does not maintain any record of such vehicles, which constitutes a violation of the Motor Vehicles Ordinance 1983.
Because of this absence of record, there is a concern about movement of unfit vehicles on roads, which often cause accidents and play a role in crimes as these vehicles and their owners’ information is not available.
Moreover, in the capital city and in many rural areas thousands of vehicles operate without any registration.
Allegations have it that many of these vehicles are running through underhand dealings with some corrupt officials of the administration and law enforcing agencies.
BRTA director (operation) Sitangshu S Biswas told New Age that they did not have any statistic of vehicles without registration.
‘Sometimes our executive magistrates spot some of these vehicles and take instant action against them. But as we do not have surveillance over all road networks, we cannot at present take action against these unregistered vehicles,’ he said.
He, however, added that with the move to cancel the registration of long-unfit vehicles the process of taking action against vehicles without registration had already started.
An emergency department circular, issued on October 10 by BRTA head office, says that ‘a significant number of vehicles’ fitness certificates were not renewed in the past 10 years flouting the ordinance.
As a result, these vehicles have become permanently unfit for use, it says.
According to BRTA website, there are a total of 27.13 lakh registered vehicles in the country till August this year.
Sitangshu S Biswas said that as per their assumption there were about 67,000 vehicle owners who did not have the fitness certificates renewed in the past 10 years.
These 67,000 motor vehicles would not include motorcycles as motorcyclists did not have to renew fitness certificates, he added.
Under the new initiative, the BRTA would be held responsible for keeping record of the permanently unfit vehicles, he also said.
MVO’s Section 44 (1) states, if a motor vehicle is destroyed or is rendered permanently unusable, the owner shall, within 14 days or as soon as possible, report the fact to the registering authority within whose jurisdiction he resides and shall forward to that authority the certificate of registration of the vehicle together with any token or card issued to authorise the use of the vehicle in a public place, and shall simultaneously send a copy of the report to the authority which issued or last renewed the certificate of fitness.
And section 44 (2) of the law stipulates that – the registering authority shall, if it is the original registering authority, cancel the registration and the certificate of registration, or, if it is not, shall forward the report and the certificate of registration to the original registering authority and that authority shall cancel the registration and the certificate of registration.
Source: New Age
