re: Unauthorized IND plates declared illegal in Tamil Nadu. Crackdown begins The Story of HSRP in Karnataka! Number plate tenders: Bidding firms in soup
It is an irony of sorts. The High Security Registration Plates (HSRP) tender called for by the Transport department has received bids from two companies which have been rejected in Delhi and Madhya Pradesh.
The two companies, M/s Romserta Technologies Limited and M/s Linkpoint Infrastructure Private Limited, bid for the HSRP project in June 2013. While both of them are in the running for the contract, it has now come to light that Rosmerta is on the verge of getting its tender cancelled by the Delhi transport department. On the other hand, Linkpoint has already lost its contract in Madhya Pradesh.
Reasons: Supply of substandard and uncertified plates, supply of plates from unapproved sources, plates being fixed at undesignated centres, overcharging. Further, it is also learnt the Karnataka Transport department had revised the tender five times to find a place for the two companies.
Meanwhile, in January 2014, the Delhi transport department formed a committee to investigate into the Rosmerta- led Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) and noted that it had violated the concession agreement signed with the department by bringing HSRPs with no source approvals. In Madhya Pradesh, Linkpoint also launched an SPV under the HSRP scheme. However, even there, charges of fraudulent transactions led the Madhya Pradesh transport department to cancel the contract.
On October 17, 2014, the transport commissioner of Madhya Pradesh terminated the concession agreement signed with M/s Link Utsav Auto system Pvt Limited, a joint venture between M/s Linkpoint Infrastructure Private Limited and Utsav Safety Systems, on charges of serious violations with regard to implementation of the scheme.
The technical partner and supplier of HSRP technology to both the companies, Utsav Safety Systems, lost its Conformity of Production certificates, issued by the technical expert consortium of Automotive Research Association of India, from January 15, 2014.
The companies are closely associated with Vivek Nagapal of M/s Shonk Technologies, against whom charge sheets were filed under section 420 of IPC by the CBI BankSecurities and fraud Cell. Two directors from Rosmerta-Pankaj Madan and Sandeep Malik - are also directors of KKH Technologies Pvt. Ltd - headed by Vivek Nagapal’s son. The two directors also hold shares in Rosmerta. A third company in Karnataka bidding for tenders, M/s Shimnit Utsch (I) Private Limited, is fighting a legal battle in the Supreme Court with the State over cancellation of its contract, awarded in 2006.
Govt version
Transport Commissioner Rame Gowda said that the department is awaiting Supreme Court’s directive before it proceeds with the tender process. “We are at present maintaining status quo. We will take a call after the Supreme Court makes a decision,” he said.
The HSRP system was made mandatory by the Centre, after Supreme Court directives to curb increasing cases of vehicle theft and other discrepancies.
DH News Service
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Need to Meet the ARTO and Seek Clarification on the usage of IND Plates in KA. considering that circulars of the ministry of road transport and highways which says that in the absence of implementation of the HSRP scheme, no number plates should bear any feature of such plates
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and this is a story of the Plates from Punjab!!!!
Chandigarh, Jan 18 - This is one ride that motorists in Punjab are going to hate. Over 1.3 million motorists in the state have been given faulty registration number plates for their vehicles and the government, which had turned a blind eye when the fraud was happening, has now cancelled the contract of a consortium which installed the faulty high security number plates.
Through an order delivered Jan 13, the Punjab transport department cancelled the contract of the consortium of three companies who were given the task in 2011 of installing high security registration plates (HSRP) on nearly 5.4 million vehicles.
The consortium comprised three companies -- Agros Impex, Frost International Limited and Trinity Engineering Services. The government has however not uttered a word on launching an inquiry into the mess.
Sources in the transport sector peg the loss to motorists to the tune of Rs.50 crore due to the faulty number plates.
According to NGO Raahat Safety Foundation, the contract was terminated by the government following a series of complaints about the number plates.
One company has been blacklisted in two other states for faulty number plates.
The issue is not about the faulty number plates alone. The companies have compromised national security by installing faulty plates which do not even fulfil the mandatory requirements under the law. These do not even have the snap locks and security numbers, international road safety expert Kamaljit Soi told IANS.
Mere cancellation is not enough. Someone needs to take responsibility for this situation. There are legal and national issues of security involved in this. Since 2011, the Punjab government chose, for whatever reasons, to ignore the discrepancies of the consortium despite complaints of poor quality number plates without security features.
What if a vehicle is used for terrorist activity or crime? We have sought a CBI or vigilance probe into this, said Soi, who was vice chairman of the Punjab government's road safety council.
When the contract for the HSRP was given to the consortium in 2011, there were over 5.4 million registered vehicles in Punjab on which the new number plates were to be installed within two years.
The companies could not even complete one-third of those vehicles.
Transport department sources say there are over seven million registered vehicles in Punjab now.
My understanding is that the faulty HSRPs have been affixed on new vehicles registered in Punjab since 2011. Out of the original 54 lakh (5.4 million) vehicles, only a limited number have got it installed, Soi said.
Transport Minister Ajit Singh Kohar said the government will look into this issue and resolve it.
But the government's move just to cancel the contract and not take action against the companies and transport department officials concerned is hardly of solace to motorists who got the faulty plates installed.
We went through the ordeal of getting the HSRP, and now we are told that these are not valid as they don't even have the security features. This is ridiculous. Was the Punjab government sleeping for the last three years? Who will pay for the new number plates? Amritsar resident Ravi Soni told IANS.
Last edited by Sunilrj : 9th February 2015 at 07:42.
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