The road transport ministry is processing the installation of number plates on vehicles used by the president, vice-president, governors and lieutenant governors. This came in wake of a petition filed by a non-profit group in the Delhi High Court. The petition mentioned that the vehicles without the number plates could be easily targeted by terrorists.
The petitioner also took to notice the difficulty in tracing the ownership of the vehicle in case of an accident. He added that not showing registration number could be considered disobeying the law.
The road transport ministry filed an affidavit to a bench of Acting Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice C Hari Shankar of the Delhi High Court. In the affidavit was mentioned to get the vehicles registered.
An official at the ministry’s affidavit read,
“The offices of the President of India, Vice President, Governors and Lieutenant Governors in the country and Secretary (Ministry of External Affairs) have been aske to vide letter dated January 2, 2018 to ensure that all the vehicles used by the President/President’s Secretariat, Vice President/Vice President’s Secretariat, Governor/ Lieutenant Governors/ or their officers/secretariat, Ministry of External Affairs be registered, if not done, and that they display registration mark as per the rules.”
The government’s counsel Rajesh Gogna told the court that fourteen vehicles used by the foreign ministry are being registered. These vehicles were used for carrying state guests from other nations.
Role of Nyayabhoomi
The non-profit group Nyayabhoomi said in its petition,
“The practice of replacing the registration mark with the State Emblem of India, instead of displaying them both, is arbitrary and symptomatic of the desire to rule rather than to serve.”
Nyayabhoomi’s secretary Rakesh Agarwal asked the court seizure of all the cars used by the people at high constitutional posts. However, the petitioner said none of the foreign ministry’s 14 cars was registered. The Rashtrapati Bhawan declined to give the registration numbers of its cars for security reasons.