Lockdown: Drastic fall in vehicle registration in April, May

According to the vehicle registration data, a total of 27,278 new vehicles were registered in April and May this year at 50 Regional Transport Offices (RTOs) of Maharashtra. In the same period last year, 4,01,961 vehicles were registered in the state.

The drop in vehicle registration and reduced tax collection due to the COVID-19 outbreak also adversely affected the revenue collection of RTOs, an official in the motor vehicles department said. In April and May, the revenue collection by RTOs was Rs 95.71 crore as against Rs 1,339.67 crore in the same period last year.

Maharashtra has the highest vehicle population of over 3.75 crores and a revenue of over Rs 8,300 crore is collected annually in the form of taxes. A senior RTO official said most of the vehicles registered in the past two months were sold in March.

The vehicles could not be immediately registered due to various issues like lockdown, delay in loan approval, and incomplete paperwork. Hence, the registration was done in the last two months, he said. Also, most of these new vehicles were registered in April as compared to May as the Supreme Court earlier extended the deadline for registration of BS-IV vehicles by a month.

In April, 21,535 new vehicles, including 17,545 two-wheelers, 1,317 four-wheelers (light motor vehicles), and other heavy vehicles, were registered. In May, the number fell further to 5,743, which included 3,045 two-wheelers, 2,597 four-wheelers, and heavy vehicles, as per the data.

Since March 22, RTO offices were functional with minimum staff, and most of the works, except vehicle registration, were stopped. Among the total new vehicles registered in April and May, 24,649 were non-transport category vehicles like personal cars and two-wheelers, and 2,629 were transport or commercial vehicles like trucks and buses, as per the data.

The maximum registrations in the two months were of two-wheelers (20,590), followed by cars (3,914). Among the 50 RTOs, the highest 1,792 new vehicles were registered in the last two months at the Pune RTO, where the registration number starts with 'MH-12', sources said.

In Mumbai, four RTOs registered 2,822 vehicles (or 6.28 percent as against the same period in 2019), including 2,062 two-wheelers and 276 four-wheelers, as compared to 44,939 vehicles in the same period last year. The highest number of 852 vehicles was registered at Tardeo RTO (MH-01), followed by Wadala RTO (MH-O3), Borivali RTO (MH-47), and Andheri RTO (MH-02) with 803, 591 and 576 vehicles, respectively.

With the easing of lockdown now, the vehicle registration activity is expected to pick up gradually, a transport official said.