Newsroom, Oct 6: If your vehicle’s insurance is expired, stay away from using it until you get the insurance renewed. Otherwise, you may lose your vehicle permanently in case you meet with an accident.
The Karnataka state government has introduced a new law to impound and auction uninsured vehicles if the owner fails to furnish proof of a third-party insurance policy in case of mishaps.
In a notification issued on Thursday, the state government prohibited courts from releasing motor vehicles involved in accidents and causing death, injury or damage to property if they do not have insurance against third party risks.
By inserting a new paragraph, “Rule 232G” in Karnataka Motor Vehicles Rules 1989, the government finally made its decision on the issue which was in the news for the past several years.
The third party insurance should be in the name of the registered owner. If the vehicle’s owner does not have such a policy or fails to produce insurance documents, then s/he can furnish “sufficient security to the satisfaction of the court to pay compensation that may be awarded” to the victim.
The new rule comes weeks after the Supreme Court asked all the states and Union territories to frame a rule whereby uninsured vehicles involved in fatal or non-fatal accidents would be auctioned and the sale proceeds, deposited with the Motor Accident Claim Tribunal (MACT) to compensate victims.
Under the Motor Vehicles Act, it is mandatory for all transport/non transport vehicles to carry a third party insurance policy so as to indemnify the victims/deceased family members in case of a road accident. But in several cases, the offending vehicles do not have a third-party insurance policy. As a result neither the owner of the vehicle nor the insurer offers to pay compensation, leaving the victim or his or her family without any remedy. The new law has addressed this issue.
Government vehicles are exempt from insurance. Section 146 of the Motor Vehicle Act states that there is no necessity for insurance against any third party loss if any vehicle is owned by the central government or a state government and used for official purposes, unconnected with any commercial enterprise. However, in the case of accident involving a government vehicle, the liability will be on the respective government to pay the compensation.
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