KARACHI:
This refers to the pending car number plates issue in Karachi. I drive a car registered for 2019. The number plate series is BQS. Although the number plate fee was charged at the time of registration, the number plate was not issued. Therefore I made a number plate copy from the market paying Rs800 and running the car with that copy. This is the practice that thousands of peoples in Karachi are following by paying an extra amount due to poor management of the Excise, Taxation and Narcotics Control Department of Sindh. Even after three years, the Excise, Taxation and Narcotics Control Department of Sindh website shows that the BQS number plate series along with many other number plate series are pending.
On 15th September, when I was moving home from the office, traffic policemen flagged me down near Siemens Chowrangi, SITE, who were checking car registration documents and cracking down fancy number plates. All my documents were OK. The only issue was the number plate. The traffic cops asked me to present an Excise department letter for “pending number plate” – something that I did not have. I had long arguments with them. I insisted that providing the original number plate at the time of registration is the responsibility of the Excise, Taxation and Narcotics Control Department of Sindh. The Traffic Police also knew that BQS and many other number plate series are pending. The senior police officer available on the spot, the DSP, said “it’s your fault. Therefore challan will be issued”. And they issued a challan for Rs520.
The Sindh High Court has repeatedly directed the Excise, Taxation and Narcotics Control Department to issue pending number plates for the vehicles immediately and restricted traffic police officials from flagging down vehicles and “harassing citizens” who had been issued registration certificates. But it seems neither Sindh Traffic Police nor the Excise, Taxation and Narcotics Control Department is taking the matter seriously. That’s why the harassing game is still on.
Shahid Iqbal
Karachi
Published in The Express Tribune, September 17th, 2022.
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