The City Traffic Police have complained to the Transport Department that the challans for violation of traffic rules are being dispatched to the registered owner, who has already sold his or her vehicle.

The previous owner will have to do the rounds of the police station to establish that the offending vehicle has already been sold. Officials in the Department say many a times, the broker or agent also connives with the buyer and does not submit the vehicle transfer documents to the jurisdictional Regional Transport Office.

“It has come to our notice that many buyers are not transferring the vehicles in their names, intentionally. Accident or any other cases involving such vehicles cannot be solved since the FIR shows the name of the previous owner as the accused, which in fact is not true,” said Bhaskar Rao, the Commissioner for Transport and Road Safety.
The Commissioner said that the sellers should insist for transferring the Registration Certificate (RC book) in the name of the buyer and ensure that Form 29 and 30 (documents pertaining to sale of a vehicle) are signed and exchanged.

Onus on the owner

He must also obtain ‘B’ extract from the RTO, issued after the transfer is effected in the vehicle documents. “The onus is on the seller. Otherwise, issues of tax evasion and other criminal cases are likely to be at back of the seller,” Rao, added.

Terming the issue as a grave problem, Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic and Security), Praveen Sood said, “The seller in most of such cases lands himself in a soup. A bigger issue is hidden as a lot of criminal activities involve vehicles. According to Indian Motor Vehicle Act, the sold vehicle must be transferred in name of the buyer within 45 days of the transaction, which however is seldom done.”

Apart from this, Sood said that both sellers and buyers are evading payment of ownership transfer fee to the RTO which also constitutes a serious offence. “Service of the violation notice sent is a minor issue, but the larger one is the embarrassment and legal issues that would follow. Obviously, cops will come to the registered owner as per the records,” he explained.

A solution, according to the Transport Department, lies in approaching only the established brokers or buying vehicles from pre-owned car showrooms and insist on completion of all formalities for transfer of ownership “The broker is also equally responsible to ensure that all legal formalities are followed” Rao said.