Mystery solved :What the law says about Vehicle Papers while Driving in India !

         Ok..so you are the law abiding citizen who normally drives carefully on road,renew vehicle insurance every year and also keep all the documents related to your vehicle in tact all the time..still on some day.,...you forget to carry the original vehicle papers with you and the same day ..the police on road stop you for checking your vehicle papers !Now you have the papers but they are at home..safe...but policeman would not listen and still demand to see the original papers right then and there or tells you to pay fine or worse ..asks for a bribe to let you go !In some cases..you have some documents but police insist on some other paper..and still fine you !What do you do in such case?..read on.... 

  

1.As per the Rules of road regulation 1989 section 32,only following documents normally need to be possessed by a vehicle owner while driving a motor vehicle in India:

 

• Driving License
• Registration Certificate for the Vehicle (RC Book/Smart Card )
 
• One time road tax paid receipt
• Vehicle Insurance policy

• Vehicle Permit (in case of transport vehicle )

• Vehicle Fitness certificate (In case of transport vehicle )

In addition to above papers,if someone demands to see anything else,then please refuse to do so as the additional papers are not required by law.Some police insist on PUC certificate,but in the above law there is no mention of PUC certificate.It may be demanded as per any local law or state law or by order of some authority.So please demand to see the order where it states that PUC is mandatory in the area where you are driving.

However ,whether mandatory by law or not,I would still recommend to do PUC for your vehicle once a year as it keeps your vehicle emissions under control.And please do a real PUC ..don't just pay for the sticker :-)  

 

 

2.In case the person driving motor vehicle do not have any of these documents in original,he can produce a attested photocopy by a gazetted officer for the same as well.So good idea would be to take photo copies of all your vehicle papers ,get them attested by govt authorities and keep a set in your car/Bike.So you can keep original documents safe at your home/office and hence no risk of losing or damaging them in transit/rains or if your vehicle gets stolen. In case you also do not have such photo copies with you when the policeman demands,you can still request for a time of 15 days from him as per the law (Rules of Road regulation 1989 section 32 ) and refuse to pay fine/bribe.You can keep your driving license as a security with him,take proper receipt and a temporary license valid for say 7 days/15 days from him,go home and get the copies and get back your license.

  

 

3.If you are not in your hometown and some policeman stops you at a place where you can not go home immediately and get the papers,don't worry...please follow the same process listed in point 2 above and you can send attested photocopies of your papers by registered post to the concerned police station within 15 days and get your license back.You may have to pay for postage for your license by money order or Indian Postal Order on the name of Accounts Officer of concerned Police jurisdiction.
 

4.But remember,if you pay any fine to police on the spot,then no matter whether you produce original documents later,you can not claim that amount back in any case from Government.Hence please don't pay fine if you genuinely forgot documents at home and can produce them in 15 days to avoid fine.
 

This article is written based on a response by Thane Rural Police to me for my Right To Information (RTI ) application to them and also based on my research of various traffic laws..Please share this to maximum people in your network and spread the awareness..Also as the RTI response gives reference to a central act like Rules of Road Regulations 1989,it is safe to assume that this applies to all territories of Union Of India and not just jurisdiction of Thane Police.It will be a good idea for others outside Maharashtra to put similar RTI applications to their local police commissioner office /supt.of police office to check whether there are any other requirements for this by state laws.
 

Thanks
 

Chinmay Gavankar

http://gavankar.blogspot.com