Should 50-year-old vehicles be called Vintage Vehicle? Govt seeks public comment

The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways wants to amend the existing law to allow registration of the vintage vehicle.

At present, any vehicle which is older than 15-year-old is not considered for the renewal of its registration under the present motor vehicle act in India. There is no law to regulate age-old vehicles which many people own in the country.

The Ministry has asked the general public through a draft notification to provide their views on the amendment in the act so that vintage vehicles can be allowed for registration. At present, there is no definition of vintage vehicles also.

“The draft rules define Vintage Motor Vehicles as all those vehicles which are two-wheelers and four-wheelers (non-commercial/personal use) and are more than 50 years old from the date of their first registration (including imported vehicle) are proposed to be called as the Vintage Motor Vehicles,” a Ministry’s press statement said.

The government has proposed that the vintage vehicle owners will apply on the “PARIVAHAN” portal and all state authorities will appoint a nodal officer to process all applications.

“States will form a Committee which will inspect a vehicle and declare whether the vehicle is fit for registration under Vintage Motor Vehicle,” it said.

It added, “If approved, a 10 digit alpha numeric number will be assigned to the respective Vintage vehicle. This registration shall be valid for 10 years. The format for the registration mark will consist of the letters “XX VA YY ****”, where VA stands for vintage, XX stands for State code, YY will be a two letter series and “****” is a number from 0001 to 9999 allotted by State Registering Authority.”