The Ministry of Road Transport & Highways (MoRTH) has refuted news that registration of new vehicles has been stopped from May 2, 2019 following a notification from banning the new Vahan 4.0 application that allowed new vehicles without bearing the new High Security Registration Plates (HSRPs).

Industry sources tell Autocar Professional that while the notification mandating new vehicles to be sold with HSRP has come into effect, the backend system has already been put in place by Regional Transport Offices (RTO) in most parts of the country. This allows authorised dealers to register new vehicles with the RTO and get the issued numberplate at the dealership.

Given the current slowdown in the overall domestic automobile market, the purported move of banning new vehicle registration would have led to considerable challenges both for OEMs and dealers.

It is learnt that while the new system has been implemented in major parts of the country, there are few areas where the linkage has not been completed and dealerships will temporarily (till the new system is linked) follow the earlier practice.