09 February,2011 08:01 AM IST | | Parth Satam
Lok Adalat organised by Regional Transport Office on Sunday collects record fines; maximum number of cases include vehicles plying without proper permit
The Lok Adalat organised by the city's Regional Transport Office (RTO) at the Shivajinangar motor vehicle court brought vehicle offenders to the book with the court fining all the 70 cases and collecting Rs 58, 000 in fines.
Advocate for the RTO Sharda Wadekar said that most of the cases included vehicles, which were plying without proper permits and drivers driving without a licence. Other cases included vehicles without documents like insurance and overloaded transport vehicles that violated the RTO's prescribed norms. Driving without licence included 25 to 30 cases.
In Lok Adalat, the money fined is lower than the ones officially prescribed by the RTO.
Talking about Lok Adalat, Wadekar said that in cases where offenders were booked for non-production of valid documents, they surprisingly produced all the documents when they came to court. "When we first caught these people without proper documentation, we sent them several reminders to bring the paperwork but they never turned up even after 6 months. This would have probably been because they were busy in their personal or professional matters. But at Lok Adalat, they produced all the documents and thus the fine charged was around Rs 1,000, which would have otherwise been around Rs 6,000."
Wadekar also talked about disputes regarding the issue of payments between former and new owners of a vehicle after the vehicle is sold. "When a vehicle is booked for a certain offence, the crime is mentioned against its record. After it is sold to a new person, the RTO either sends a reminder to the address available in its records and most of the times it is the old owner. This leads to disputes between the two people as to who is liable to pay the fine. During the court, vehicle owners realised that changing the ownership details is extremely important during second-hand sales. This not only helps the RTO in maintaining records but also car owners since it will do away with confusion when any future decision about a vehicle is to be taken," said Wadekar.
In cases of overloaded transport vehicles, a truck from Orissa, which was booked for overloading. It was fined about Rs 18,000, which would otherwise have been Rs 22,000. This is a rare development according to RTO officials since trucks from outside the state usually escape.
