Traffic Cops to Seize Vehicles With 10+ Challans

Hyderabad: Traffic police in tri-commissionerates have decided to take strict action against vehicle owners — including private travel bus operators and two-wheeler riders — who have accumulated more than 10 pending traffic challans. Officials said such vehicles would be seized immediately, and police teams would visit the owners’ residences to collect the dues.

The move follows the recent Vemuri Kaveri bus mishap in Kurnool, where the vehicle involved had unpaid challans worth Rs 40,000. The incident prompted traffic police to coordinate with the road transport authority (RTA) officials to segregate pending challan data by vehicle category.

Madhapur traffic DCP T. Sai Manohar said there was no separate database for private buses, as violations such as overspeeding, no-parking and red-light jumping were recorded under the broader “heavy vehicle” category. “We will work with RTA officials to segregate data for bikes, four-wheelers, auto-rickshaws, travel buses and other heavy vehicles. Once the data is updated, identifying violators will be easier,” he said.

For the first time, Cyberabad traffic police have formed a 20-member team to analyse pending challan data daily and trace vehicles with heavy dues, especially private buses registered in Telangana and neighbouring states. “Once identified, teams will locate the vehicle owners, visit their residences, and collect the fines. Vehicles with long-pending challans will be seized immediately,” Manohar explained.

Citing an example, officials said a four-wheeler with more than 40 pending challans worth `35,000 was recently traced to an owner in Bengaluru. “A team went there and found that the owner, who regularly travelled to Hyderabad for medical treatment, had violated traffic rules multiple times on one-way roads. He was brought to Cyberabad and cleared all dues,” police said.

Rachakonda traffic DCP D. Srinivas said that since most private travel buses operate from Hyderabad and Cyberabad, coordination among the three commissionerates was crucial. “We are deploying special teams at key junctions to verify registration numbers and target operators with multiple violations. This will help clear long-pending challans on private buses as well as other vehicles,” he said.

Improved coordination with RTA

RTA officials said they would work closely with traffic police to identify high-value violators under the Motor Vehicles Act. “In view of the Kurnool accident, we plan to categorise challan data by vehicle type and integrate it with traffic police databases. A proposal for government approval has already been submitted,” said Hyderabad RTA officer Purushotham Reddy.

Officials also said several travel buses registered in neighbouring states had pending challans in Telangana. The RTA is considering writing to the transport authorities of those states to suspend vehicle registrations or deny fitness certificates until dues are cleared. The traffic department is also planning to create technically skilled data teams and adopt new software to categorise challans vehicle-wise, reducing manual workload.

Checking affect

As many as 600 private travel operators have halted services after the RTA and traffic police intensified inspections across Telangana. Officials said around 500 buses operate daily between Hyderabad and Vijayawada. Following strict enforcement drives, nearly all of them have stopped operations after being found violating traffic and Motor Vehicle Act norms.