Applied for registration...still: New licence plates may take 3 weeks

Excise dept says the delay was caused by a late payment from the finance dept.

KARACHI:

All those people who just bought new cars or motorcycles may have to wait another three weeks to get their licence plates as the excise and taxation department has yet to receive them from the manufacturers.

A Clifton resident, Attaullah Malick, bought a new car two months ago but he has not been able to procure a licence plate. “I am tired of visiting Civic Centre to get the licence plate because each time I visit, they give me a new date,” he said.



The police are not making it any easy either. “I hate it when the police tell me that I am a good citizen and I should abide by the laws,” he said.

“They don’t ask for bribe but it’s very irritating when you suffer due to others’ faults.” To avoid the hassle, Malick uses his old car.

The Express Tribune has learnt that the department gave the manufacturing contract to a new company, which has not even produced a single licence plate. The department placed the order a month ago, said an official in the excise and taxation department.

According to the officer, the department registers up to 200 vehicles every day, which means that it has to meet the demands of more than 10,000 licence plates to date, and the numbers keep adding every day.

“People curse us every day when they ask for their licence plates and we are unable to give them anything,” he admitted, accepting that commuters are harassed by the police, who demand bribes if they don’t find registered licence plates. “The department should be providing licence plates to car and motorcycle owners the same day it receives their registration documents instead of delaying it for months.”



Not everyone is upset with the attitude of the police. “Policemen are good,” said Sher Bahadar Khan, a rickshaw driver in Keamari. “They only take Rs50 and leave us alone.”

Rickshaw driver usually get by paying the police but Khan felt they should have proper ones issued by the department.

“The ones we get from Patel Para fade quickly and then we have to get new ones that cost Rs150.” Khan added that the excise department is not issuing number plates to rickshaws but they are still charging licence plate fee. Even car showroom owners are paying the price. “People who have not received their number plates for over five months have started coming to us with complaints,” said Muhammad Haroon, the owner of a showroom on University Road.

“We contacted the excise department and they said the licence plates will come after Eid,” he said, adding that some people get their own fancy plates made but those aren’t acceptable to the police.

For their part, the excise department officials hope the licence plates will start coming in the 10 days.

“The finance department could not provide us the money in time which caused delay in the number plates,” the department’s motor vehicle registration wing director, Shabbir Ahmed Sheikh said. “Now the private company has been paid and we are expecting the plates to start coming from mid July.”

Sheikh promised that all those people who have paid their fee will be given the plates.

“We provide the owners a receipt with a computerised stamp when they apply for registration and the licence plate,” he explained. “With that receipt, they can use the vehicle until they get their number plates.”

Published in The Express Tribune, July 4^th, 2013.