[abhishek46]

From the news, it looks like a blanket ban. However, a lot of things are not clear.

What will happen to people who have diesel cars which are 8-9 years old AND still going strong?
What will happen to people whose diesel cars are older than 10 years?

Looks like judgments like this will gravely affect sales of Diesel cars.

[man_of_steel]

Originally Posted by Viju

The same goes for private car owners as well who might have bought a used diesel car with their life-savings only because that is what they could afford to buy and run.

Just very recently, I bought a 2005 Safari 3.0 Dicor 4x4 out of sheer passion. And I have used whatever I could call as my savings to bring it up to top shape with no plan of selling it soon while being completely aware of the resale value I will be looking at as a second owner. It is a KA registered one as of now but I have a growing uneasy feeling on this ban.

So my question to authorities is: I have committed a sin of buying an old vehicle because of my various preferences including passion, affordability etc. These factors will never be taken into account by anyone and it hardly matters for anyone else. Will I have to just send my prized possession to the scrapyard just because someone did a half ass calculation and narrowed down the cause of pollution to every 10+ years old diesel passenger cars? And no, I am not even talking about getting back the money I spent on my truck here. What's next for a common man like me who happened to follow his passion slightly?

[Yeldo]

There are some interesting things in this interim order.

1) Some reports suggest that the petitioners were not seeking an immediate ban as meted out in the interim order. The bench took only a few minutes to go into the petition, some media reports say.

2) The NGT banned vehicles older than 10 years in Kochi city, but in neigbouring the Eloor Municipality, there is no ban. Many research reports indicate that parts of Eloor are among the most polluted locations in the whole country. One report even calls it a 'pollution hotspot'.

3) The NGT is not bound by the tedious adherence to codes and procedures, and is supposed to ensure that 'natural justice' prevails. Whether such an extreme measure taken for the intervening time without hearing the parties constitute the concept of 'natural justice', I am unsure of.

4) On exempting "local authority" vehicles, it needs to be clarified what exactly come under this definition. The state bench of the tribunal cannot hod a state level authority to be "local", so it should possibly mean vehicles of Local Self Government (LSG) institutions. AFAIK, only corporations are allowed to procure vehicles on their own, and for all other LSG institutions, it is the state LSG Department that buys and allots the vehicles. I admit I am not fully aware of the procedure, so if somebody would enlighten me, it would be great.

5) The soundness of a 2,000 cc cap or values in a pollution check, all are secondary issues. If the ban on vehicles helps somehow to clean up our environment, such matters are of little consequence. Nothing is 'more than enough ' when it comes to bring pollution under control

6) The NGT, I hope, would in its final order, award a refund of 5 years road tax to the owners of private vehicles.

7) I hope on appeal, the SC may allow the State Government at least a year's time to make budgetary provisions to replace vehicles- including KSRTC buses- that are more than 10 years old, and public vehicles, ie, buses, police, fire & rescue vehicles and ambulances are given exemption till then.

8) The NGT bench would hopefully suggest an environmentally friendly method to deal with the scrapped 10+ year old vehicles that are sure to pile up in the state.

9) Those unfortunate private persons who own 10+ year old vehicles like taxis, auto- rickshaws and buses, who find their livelihoods under threat, I expect the government to offer them tax rebates on the new vehicles they buy to replace their old ones.

9) Seeing how this order came out, IMHO, it is high time that the government stops creating a fourth pillar of the state- these authorities, tribunals, boards and commissions. They do nothing effective than adding layers of red tape. Such quasi- executive, quasi- judiciary bodies seem to serve no other purpose than as favors for retired judges and senior civil servants. Let the ministers head the executive, and implement the laws passed by the legislature, and the judiciary keep an eye over them.

10) NGOs and self styled do gooders should be made to maintain some standards of peer review, disclosure, reporting and public scrutiny befor they are allowed to take up so called matters of 'public interest'.

Finally,

Originally Posted by Captain Haddock

An advasi may not.pay income tax but every commodity or service when bought has a tax component to it and no one.is exempted from it.

Originally Posted by Captain Haddock

the tax given by an adivasi could be used to subsidise the fuel in a Landcruiser or Fortuner, ironic because the adivasi may not be able to pay for two square meals a day.

Originally Posted by Rahul Rao

Which state is subsidizing diesel. Diesel subsidy ended in Nov 2014. As of now both Diesel and Petrol attract Rs 3 and Rs 6 as basic exise duty. Rs 9/Lit as additional exise duty, and Vat which varies from state to state, with diesel usually in the 12.5 % or 14.5 % catagory, and Petrol in the much higher 20% catagory.

While Rahul Rao has adequately addresses your concerns on Diesel subsidy, Captain Haddock, I am really hurt to see that in this day and age, you are using the word 'adivasi'.

Being unable to afford "two square meals a day" has nothing to do with being an 'adivasi'. Hunger and deprivation are not linked to your caste.

I find your remark "advasi may not.pay income tax" disappointing and unpleasant. Your 'adivasis', or those belonging to the Scheduled Tribes to correctly put it, are not exempted from Income Tax or any other tax. They contribute to the tax kitty in their own way. There are many people from the Scheduled Tribes who serve the society as doctors, scientists, civil servants, educationists, etc. and they pay their taxes like any other honest citizen.

So I humbly suggest we take exception to such remarks which bears negatively on the appropriateness and propriety of this forum.

[Sip]

Though we all are concerned with pollution and environmental health. What is essential here is an holistic approach rather than such bans here and there. Govt must regulate the production of such vehicles IMHO. Earlier government allowed diesel cars to increase for lure of taxes and now this. Hopefully people take alarm out this and take a forward looking decision before any purchase rather than expecting some rational action from government !

NGT is not an overnight entity. They didn't acted in time and now want others to pay for their failures ! I hope they act in a better way.

[Hazi.Kin]

Banning diesel vehicles only in 6 corporation areas doesn’t make sense. Right now we don’t have any mechanism to block diesel air pollution from non-corporation areas to corporation areas to make corporation area clean.

[pillainp]

So based on the NGT's (in)sane new orders, it looks like the Innova Crysta is dead out of the stable doors in all the major areas in Kerala where it would sell the most.

Thank the Gods we got our XUV a couple months ago. Just beat the bullet on this one.

[shobhitk]

Originally Posted by sdp1975

Well the TOI report does not say anything about 2000 cc - so it appears that all diesel vehicles older than 10 years , will be banned.

I also did not see any other news channels carrying this news - and assuming it's correct, will wait for more details to come in.

NGT order clearly says that all the diesel vehicles, older than 10 years will cease to ply after the enforcement of the NGT order.

[Kandisa]

This had to happen. When the NCR ban was announced i had a feeling this will be slowly executed throughout the country & posted the same. And it is indeed going that way. And there is no point in discussing about the logic behind the cut-off of 2000 cc because it is not based on any pollution logic as such! A decision had to be given for a certain reason and explanation for that was curved out accordingly.

Originally Posted by ajayclicks

..When I purchased my XUV500 in March (in Bangalore), I asked the dealer if I could opt for the 1.9L engine. I was told that it was only for NCR. I wish Mahindra had offered it to rest of the country as well..

Now this is bad. Mahindra must had the idea that the 2000 cc ban was not only going to be restricted within NCR alone. They are not a fool to develop & plonk a new engine just for a region. So when a customer was asking for a solution which they had already implemented, they should have responded positively.

[Hemant_Joshi]

Does this apply only to KL Registered vehicles ? What about vehicles transiting Kerala ?

NGT is fast becoming a Joke, and Banning seems to be a favorite action of Govt, Quasi Govt entities, for anything that they are NOT able to handle scientifically or with common sense approach,
Another decision taken with scant regard to implementation.. big noise on paper and practically useless,

Mahindra's 1.9L XUV is a classic case of how such decisions can be circumvented,, Cant figure out, how a 1.9 L engine can be any less polluting than a 2.0L engine, with NO other changes or technical advancements...

Originally Posted by shobhitk

NGT order clearly says that all the diesel vehicles, older than 10 years will cease to ply after the enforcement of the NGT order.

[NikhilReddy]

We should not takeaway anything from the people who are trying hard to protect our mother nature. I look back and think about my childhood days where I could drink water from any hand- pump without any hesitation. I could find enough trees to rest during play breaks etc. Don't remember going to a doctor except for vaccinations or occasional accidents. A lot have changed due to thoughtless exploitation of natural resources. If we continue this exploitation we will not be leaving anything good for our future generations.

For a moment I am not supporting this mindless ban. But I strongly believe the previous governments both central and state has not done enough to mitigate this situation. The day is not far when the judiciary will ban all the cars which don't carry airbags and motorbikes which don't have ABS.

There could be a strong lobby that is going all out to cap engine at 2000cc to help some manufacturers gain market share taking advantage of the regulation.

NGT should be more reasonable and should have a solid plan to protect the nature. They should have engaged manufacturers to bring this change. In Hyderabad Local autos, old government vehicles, very old garbage collection vehicles, lake encroachment and industries dumping their waste is causing more pollution compared to private vehicles above 2000cc.

NGT should also understand that they are not doing any good by making automobile manufacturers guess what products and technologies they should invest in. Due to this uncertainty manufacturers may not want to invest in India. Forget creating new jobs people may lose jobs. NGT should understand both economic development and environment protection must go hand in hand.

[--gKrish--]

Banning diesels older than 10 years and above 2000cc IMHO will not do any good in saving the Earth from pollution.

Without proper care, a 5 year old diesel is enough to smoke like hell. In these dusty cities with crawling traffic, a clogged air filter and inefficient EGR can be found in less than 5 year old diesels and they will smoke a 100 times more than a good ol' diesel merc.
(Before EGR cleaning our linea used to give smoke because of clogged EGR due to crawling in city and lack of spirited drives).

I am not saying the NGT is trying to make business for automobile giants who are ready with diesel mills or make existing diesel users scrap their car and get new cars. I am just saying that to this 17 year old , this move does not sound any different from the US Govt. banning the high mpg cars(VW XL1 etc.) in the pretext of not meeting american standards but well for european standards and never beacuse it would have been a big hit to the oil companies.

OT : No sunfilms but curtains are alright.These NGT guys' chauffuers sleep in the cars with engine running for AC(for hours) for saving their nature. Like someone said above, its high time we should act to dissolve before they come up with newer and updated nonsense.

[DicKy]

Originally Posted by NikhilReddy

There could be a strong lobby that is going all out to cap engine at 2000cc to help some manufacturers gain market share taking advantage of the regulation.

Forgive for sounding like a conspiracy theory maker.

But i have had slight doubts from the day the sub 4m 'small car' norms were rolled out, which unequivocally favored two of the top selling companies.

Add to that the feet dragging over safety issues for the past decade,
giving of subsidies to environmental friendly 'hybrid' engines and this latest obsession with the 2000cc limit.

Clue: Except for an almost defunct model, all their other models are sub 1600cc

[nmenon]

I am from Cochin and I find this kind of knee jerk reaction really stupid.

Having been a regular commuter on these roads for nearly 20 years now, I have a few observations.

First, I'm all for reduction of pollution and cleaning up the environment.
But there is a science behind everything coming up with crazy decisions like banning 10 year old diesel vehicles and diesels above 2L doesn't really make any sort of sense except to affect the lives of a good percentage of the meagre tax paying population.

Second, why can't they actually look into something more scientific, like actually checking the pollution of vehicles properly, I went to get my car's PUC renewed recently and couldn't find a single centre near me which would actually do a proper test.
The 3 places I enquired, all only looked at the idling emissions and I had to finally settle for one of those due to the impracticality of trawling the city to find an honest PUC centre.

Why not run these PUC centres properly?

The biggest joke though is the exemption of commercial and govt. vehicles from this ban.

They are the biggest polluters I have ever seen, with buses especially belching out smoke screen which any army unit of the past would be proud of.

And finally the two most important points in economic and the so called rights that we have as citizens of this country.
1. You pay 15 years of lifetime tax, what happens to the 5 years of life your car that are now no longer valid and the corresponding 5 years worth of tax paid, do they pay us back. (I suspect if somebody actually asked this question they'd get a response that it serves you right to lose the money, having polluted for 10 years).

2. Why am I or anyone else for that matter suddenly prevented from purchasing a vehicle that meets my needs/ requirements just because it happens to have a larger engine than what a tribunal suddenly decided was too large. Isn't that against the right to freedom?

3. What happens to those people whose livelihood depends on these large vehicles, i.e. Taxi drivers/ operators who are not part of a fleet?

I would like to know who these people are that come up with such harebrained solutions to valid problems.

Also as far as I know Diesel is no longer subsidised it's just that taxes are lesser on diesel.
It may not be currently possible to eliminate this difference in fuel prices unless all commercial vehicles are specially fuelled only in pumps designated for them where prices are maintained at current levels and private individuals are not allowed to refuel at these pumps.

[Captain Haddock]

Originally Posted by Yeldo

There are some interesting things in this interim order.


While Rahul Rao has adequately addresses your concerns on Diesel subsidy, Captain Haddock, I am really hurt to see that in this day and age, you are using the word 'adivasi'.

Being unable to afford "two square meals a day" has nothing to do with being an 'adivasi'. Hunger and deprivation are not linked to your caste.

I find your remark "advasi may not.pay income tax" disappointing and unpleasant. Your 'adivasis', or those belonging to the Scheduled Tribes to correctly put it, are not exempted from Income Tax or any other tax. They contribute to the tax kitty in their own way. There are many people from the Scheduled Tribes who serve the society as doctors, scientists, civil servants, educationists, etc. and they pay their taxes like any other honest citizen.

So I humbly suggest we take exception to such remarks which bears negatively on the appropriateness and propriety of this forum.

I have not used adivasi term as a slur. Most tribal people are proud of their heritage and would proudly say that they are adivasi.adi vasi in sanskrit simply means the initial residents. If it still hurts anyone I extend my apologies.I personally hold all castes in high esteem.

When I said that they dont pay income taxes,I meant that they are poor and the govt does not demand that from them.But the indian system has a lot of hidden taxes in services and commodities which spare no one.
The money so extracted from the weakest sections is one of the sources which finance diesel subsidy.

Even Kofi Annan has stated that the subsidy system is flawed and goes against basic principles of public finance.

A large section of SC/ST people are poor as per national surveys.

Since, this forum is about automobiles I will not venture deep into social sciences.

KSRTC has stated that only 10 percentage of their vehicles are over 10 years. Source-The Hindu

Taxi operators are only asking for a time extension,even they agree in principle.Source-The Hindu.

Today's THE HINDU has reported that diesel exhaust is more dangerous and SUVs which are mostly affected by 2000 cc cap pollute more than cars.

This ruling has been in the pipeline,Mr Jairam Ramesh had considered such steps to curb rampant SUV culture during the UPA govt's tenure.

As per our deomocratic tradition,SUVs should not be banned but discouraged by these kind of laws.

[jeeva]

These madmen at the NGT make me seriously contemplate investing in a horse.

Pros:
These folks would absolutely love its eco friendly exhaust system
Can't ban a horse for god's sake
Good ride and handling
Permanent 4 wheel drive
Low maintenance

Cons:
Will have to get used to its occasional neighing, instead of listening to the turbo whistle.
Hmm, night driving seems to a problem.

https://www.olx.in/item/horse-perfec...tml#0cb24209dd