Protect & Preserve Vintage Motor vehicles –Historical Vehicle Clubs & Museums Make Strong Pitch

A Joint representation was made recently to the Nitin Gadkari, Union Road Transport and Highways Minister, the representation consisted of nearing to 45 historic vehicle clubs as well as museums in India, they made a strong pitch for both protection as well as preservation of the vintage motor vehicles.

In a letter to Gadkari, on 19th April, the joint representation flagged "four critical matters" which needs to be addressed adequately with regards to rules concerning special provisions to register vintage motor cycles, proposed to be notified by his ministry.

Singhania, urged the minister that, Vintage motor vehicles more than 30 years from the date of manufacturer kindly to be permitted to be registered as per the draft rules, Special Provision of Registration of Vintage Motor Vehicles" as these vehicles would be very few in number and they form a significant part of the national automotive heritage.

He further added in the letter, that these vehicles will not be used for any commercial purpose whatsoever, for personal use, these vehicles must be allowed freely with no other purpose restrictions.

The Major exemptions requested were

• Emission compliances

• Securing pollution under control certificate

• Securing a certificate of fitness

Singhania said, Gadkari, all of these may be kindly granted and he requested these exemptions to be specifically offered as the above vehicles have historic importance and cannot be altered or modified to meet the required emission/pollution/fitness norms, which are applicable to later production cars. If they perform any alteration or modification to these historic vehicles it would lead to complete destruction of its both originality as well as authenticity of these historic vehicles.

The letter stated, to enable the transparent registration of these Vintage Motor Vehicles, a self Declaration/Certification/Indemnity by the owner, consisting essential registration particulars must suffice, just as in the case of Income Tax Returns. There may not require a representative belonging to any private Automobile Association, committee or club to be involved in this process for both approval and rejection of the registration of Vintage Motor Vehicle. These private representatives in the varied state committees might create unessential red tape and offer scope for influence peddling and corruption.

In the letter, the representation urged the minister to reconsider for the sake promoting tourism, culture, employment, manufacture as well as revenue to the government. The above move would also help in promoting both our national heritage as well as our culture.