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Old 8th January 2009, 06:16   #16
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Hey I payed the same amount for a lancer. I did not do any questioning. There was a huge que and I was happy to pay and drive off asap.

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Originally Posted by indrajits View Post
Recently while travelling from Kolkata to Puri on 23rd December, we were forced to pay Rs 1050 as Motor Vehicles tax at the Orissa border for the Scorpio LX. Is this tax legal? Will our government do something about it? On questioning the authorities we were shown these 2 notices. Can anyone clarify and react to this, and what should be the course of action to repeal this permanently.Attachment 86957

Attachment 86958
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Old 9th January 2009, 01:34   #17
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That is precisely the point. So did I, to avoid inconvenience.No other state has this rule. The notification says--not more than 2 quarters or 6 months. Therefore, I am within my rights to pay only for 7 days(my period of stay) ONLY. Why should I pay for 6 months? What is our Transport or Motor Vehicles Department doing? Let them at least levy such charges reciprocally on vehicles from Orissa. This law will go for a six if challenged in court. But who will bell the cat? Till then the Orissa Motor Vehicles will laugh and make lakhs of Rupees per day from travellers from Bengal...What a shame....
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Old 11th January 2009, 00:27   #18
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Its really awkward and day light robbery to charge the tax. Something needs to be done about it. Having a private vehicle, we are entitled to take it anywhere in India without paying any state-specific tax, as long as we do not move to that particular state.

Can someone bring this to the notice of the Kolkata press?

@Senindra: Loved the pics. I have always wanted to do this route by road. Keep them coming. Where did you stay at Gopalpur? Heard that the Oberoi resort is closed now. Is that true?

Are we waiting a travelogue from @1100D as well. I seems that @1100D is making up the most of driving on Indian roads after returning from US.

Last edited by Saurabh M : 11th January 2009 at 00:29.
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Old 11th January 2009, 14:07   #19
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Originally Posted by Saurabh M View Post
@Senindra: Loved the pics. I have always wanted to do this route by road. Keep them coming. Where did you stay at Gopalpur? Heard that the Oberoi resort is closed now. Is that true?
.
I stayed at Swosti resort. Did not even know Oberoi had a resort in Gopalpur, so the probability of it being closed is quite high .

Not too many more pics. I have uploaded them on flickr and I do not know if it is allowed to post the link or not, if it is not the mods can kindly remove it - Flickr: Indrajeet Sen's Photostream

I'll be back in India for 3 weeks starting from the 20th, now planning the road trips for those 3 trips other than getting a little more stuff done up on the car
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Old 11th January 2009, 22:52   #20
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Quote:
Originally Posted by indrajits View Post
Recently while travelling from Kolkata to Puri on 23rd December, we were forced to pay Rs 1050 as Motor Vehicles tax at the Orissa border for the Scorpio LX. Is this tax legal? Will our government do something about it? On questioning the authorities we were shown these 2 notices. Can anyone clarify and react to this, and what should be the course of action to repeal this permanently
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Originally Posted by senindra View Post
Hey I payed the same amount for a lancer. I did not do any questioning. There was a huge que and I was happy to pay and drive off asap.
I had to shell out Rs 800. the amount did not matter to me but the pretext of tax collection did. I wasn't cool about it, however Dad forced me to pay up and leave. There wasn't any other option, they had the gate pulled down. Never ever have we paid such taxes on entering any state in the past.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Saurabh M View Post
Its really awkward and day light robbery to charge the tax. Something needs to be done about it. Having a private vehicle, we are entitled to take it anywhere in India without paying any state-specific tax, as long as we do not move to that particular state.

Can someone bring this to the notice of the Kolkata press?

@Senindra: Loved the pics. I have always wanted to do this route by road. Keep them coming. Where did you stay at Gopalpur? Heard that the Oberoi resort is closed now. Is that true?

Are we waiting a travelogue from @1100D as well. I seems that @1100D is making up the most of driving on Indian roads after returning from US.

I am not planning on any travelogue on this. The trip was uneventful. Although have taken quite a few pictures, I wouldn't do any free publicity for Orissa after they robbed me, in the name of road tax, for entering their state with my personal car for a period of 4 days only.

Moreover there were too many bikes in Bhubaneshwar (Which the locals fancy calling "BBSR" ) and most of them were driving scattered all over the road. Even the crowd that we saw at most points of interest, the less said the better (People who are familiar with the Puri area, dont get me wrong, but the percentage of Bengali tourists out there this time, was much lower than what we have seen on earlier occasions, so I am not pinpointing any particular community).

But then, at the end of the day, it was that road tax which woke up a critical eye to everything we saw.

Last edited by 1100D : 11th January 2009 at 22:54.
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Old 12th January 2009, 01:33   #21
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I am amazed that they charge this tax to the vehicles from other states! Or is it for vehicles only from Kolkata?

I was in Gopalpur for around 3-4 days around christmas, last month. No one there charged me anything. I crossed over from Andhra border and then again entered back after my stay.

Hmmm...

EDIT: There is a very easy solution to stir up the hornet's nest. Take a Rs.5 RTI form and then fill it up enquiring about this practice and send it to Orrisa MVD and mark a copy to Central MVD / Ministry of Surface Transport.

Last edited by Zappo : 12th January 2009 at 01:37.
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Old 12th January 2009, 11:36   #22
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Strange to hear about the temporary road tax in OR. We most definitely didn't pay anything of the sort during the GQ drive.

Would this be applicable only for WB registered vehicles?
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Old 13th January 2009, 13:10   #23
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Zappo View Post
EDIT: There is a very easy solution to stir up the hornet's nest. Take a Rs.5 RTI form and then fill it up enquiring about this practice and send it to Orrisa MVD and mark a copy to Central MVD / Ministry of Surface Transport.
It isn't as easy. We have never faced such extortion in the past. But this time the officer at the checkpost was quite naive about his interpretation of the circular. If you look at it carefully, in Indrajits post, it desn't make it mandatory to collect taxes from vehicles entering the state. I pointed out the content to him. He indicated we either pay or not cross the checkpost into Orissa. He himself suggested that we find out from the Orissa Motor Vehicles dept.

Even if we file a RTI, they will come back saying it is not mandatory for vehicles entering on temporary basis. The officer will also be given a clean chit on grounds of the fact that it was a voluntary payment from us.

His motivation is that, he gets to show higher tax collection on his quota.

The very fact that the option of volunteering was a forced one, does not count.


Quote:
Originally Posted by indrajits View Post
Recently while travelling from Kolkata to Puri on 23rd December, we were forced to pay Rs 1050 as Motor Vehicles tax at the Orissa border for the Scorpio LX. Is this tax legal? Will our government do something about it? On questioning the authorities we were shown these 2 notices. Can anyone clarify and react to this, and what should be the course of action to repeal this permanently.Attachment 86957

Attachment 86958

Quote:
Originally Posted by senindra View Post
I did not do any questioning. There was a huge que and I was happy to pay and drive off asap.
I was not happy to pay and drive. I had almost put up a resistance, thinking other vehicle owners would join me. But they too were okay with paying and driving. While we were at the checkpost at least five other vehicles paid the tax and went ahead. In the end he just remarked politely "everybody is paying, see, know the rules first before you venture out to drive".

The big question is till what extent will we continue to be happy. Our "getaway" was more valuable than the money value, but at the cost of what?

Infact a truck driver, upon asking later that day, said "Sau rupiya deta aur nikal jaata saab"

Was he smarter than us?

I just wish that this is not just a beginning of deeper things to come.

Last edited by 1100D : 13th January 2009 at 13:20.
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Old 13th January 2009, 13:28   #24
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i had posted this information before. here
It seems the practice for collecting unlawful taxes is not stopped.
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Old 13th January 2009, 14:25   #25
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The new toll collection culture on our highways has prompted many corrupt officials posted along the highway to start extorting money from private non-commercial vehicles in this way. While entering Maithan the CRPF check post constable demanded Rs 30 from me !! I just sped away after I realised it was just a false extortion.
Meanwhile I have spoken to a senior journalist with The Telegraph about this Orissa extortion. Let's see if something comes out of it.
I think we should write to various government departments in Orissa. I doubt if the bosses in Bhubaneswar are aware of this racket.
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Old 13th January 2009, 14:41   #26
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Something has to be done . I have seen pondicherry regd. vehicles running in kerala for more than a decade .Seldom they were asked to stop. Only problem you could face is that you cant use it for a driving license test .

From this forum i have been able to understand that karnataka is also not far behind in this practice .
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Old 13th January 2009, 15:26   #27
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Apparently this circular (which I originally thought was a cooked up one by the border guy) is genuine and finds partial mention in their website.

New Page 4

What they are doing is basically charging a presumptive tax. The presumption being that you are going to stay in the state forever and not pay them road tax (not to speak of the missed sales tax). Therefore, logically it should follow that they should refund the money when you come out of the state in four five days.
If challenged in any court of law this tax will be quashed. But then who will take the trouble? Private motorists are not organised. Earlier AAEI used to take up such cases and fight for us but now it's more of a cheap watering hole for shady promoter types, than anything else.
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Old 13th January 2009, 16:00   #28
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They asked me to pay Tax while we were returning to Kolkata.

so the theory of Presumption goes out of the BOX.
The person In charge told me, that no matter how many days you stay in Orissa you have to Pay Tax.

And am not the kind of person, who will pay money to avoid crowd or queues.
If it was a right thing, i would have paid. But i won't pay a single penny only because it saves me lots of hassles.
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Old 14th January 2009, 21:37   #29
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Quote:
Originally Posted by thebagchi View Post
And am not the kind of person, who will pay money to avoid crowd or queues.

If it was a right thing, i would have paid. But i won't pay a single penny only because it saves me lots of hassles.
Perfect, thats how these scumbags should be dealt with.


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Originally Posted by swathyd View Post
Did you also face the tax problem while crossing to orissa from westbengal .
Absolutely not, crossed the borders smoothly on the NH6 while going and coming back.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Sudipto-S-Team View Post
Meanwhile I have spoken to a senior journalist with The Telegraph about this Orissa extortion. Let's see if something comes out of it.

I think we should write to various government departments in Orissa. I doubt if the bosses in Bhubaneswar are aware of this racket.
Yes do have the journalist follow up on this, this does require to be rectified. Just a hunch that this may have some tacit approval of someone on the top, they have come up with this ingenious way to make up for all the commercial taxes that they lost while this NH5 part was closed due to the floods.

All the telephone numbers are there out in that site
http://www.orissatransport.nic.in/teldir.htm

and also a "Grievances" by which one can send a mail.
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Old 12th November 2009, 09:57   #30
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I am planning for a drive to Kolkata from Hyderbad. let me know if there is any alternate route to Skip this Tax.

I don't want to pay some illegal tax and make some one rich. After all it's my HARD - EARNED MONEY.
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