Registration of 15-year-old government vehicles to be cancelled: Himachal Pradesh Deputy CM

Registration of government vehicles completing 15 years would be cancelled and these vehicles would be scrapped, Himachal Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Mukesh Agnihotri, who also holds the transport portfolio, said on January 13.

Registration of government vehicles completing 15 years would be cancelled and these vehicles would be scrapped, Himachal Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Mukesh Agnihotri, who also holds the transport portfolio, said on January 13.

Addressing reporters, Mr. Agnihotri said that six scrapping centres would be established in Himachal Pradesh and expression of interest has been invited for setting up these centres under the scrapping policy. These vehicles would be replaced with electric vehicles.

Terming it as a "year of reforms" in the Transport Department, the Deputy Chief Minister said the fitness certificates of private vehicles would be issued through automatic testing stations. Earlier, it was done manually.

Informing that 50% of the total accidents take place on the national highways and human error is responsible for the majority of the road accidents, he said that directions have been issued for identification of accident-prone stretches (black spots) to take remedial steps with the help of the Public Works Department and district administrations.

A deadline has been set to install an intelligent traffic management system and CCTVs at all 12 transport barriers in the state by June 30, 2024.

There are 22,43,524 vehicles in the state, including 19,25,593 private and 3,17,931 commercial vehicles. At present, there are 2,811 electric vehicles in the state, majority of which are two wheelers. Out of these, 2,412 are private vehicles and 399 are commercial vehicles, he informed.

As many as 1,221 applications have been received for 500 e-taxis to be given to the youth and seven electric charging stations have been set up on Chandigarh to Keylong road. By February-end, 17 more such stations would become functional, he added.