Motor Vehicle Department taps NIC to track Puducherry-registered cars

Kochi: With many owners keeping their Puducherry-registered vehicles off roads to avoid getting caught by enforcement authorities for attempted tax evasion, the Motor Vehicle Department (MVD) has sought the assistance of the National Informatics Centre to collect details of such vehicles.

“We sought the assistance of the National Informatics Centre and with their assistance, collected online details of vehicles having a local address in the state being shown as permanent addresses in the Registration Certificates. This way, we’ll be able to reach them even if they chose to hide their vehicles by keeping them off our roads,” said enforcement RTO (Ernakulam) K. M. Shaji.

"Initially, details of vehicles costlier than Rs 10 lakh will be collected. Notices will be sent to the owners asking them to submit proof that the vehicles are operated in the Union Territory on a permanent basis. Field officers will then be asked to verify whether they are largely operated in the state in which case they will get another notice asking them to remit the requisite tax.”

The MVD officials are also in the process of verifying details of 30-odd Puducherry-registered vehicles found to have local financing with the assistance of the respective finance companies.

Insurance policies issued locally and frequent usage of local service centres were some other avenues to expose vehicles registered in Puducherry to evade high taxes here. While the tax on luxury cars in Puducherry is around 13.75 percent, it's 20 percent in Kerala.