Vehicle population in State up by 7.89 per cent, crosses 2.75 crore mark

Tamil Nadu ranks second in vehicular population in the country, next only to Maharashtra, the Minister said, tabling the policy note of the Motor Vehicles Acts- Administration Department in the Assembly.

While the overall number of vehicles stood at 2.76 crore as on March 31, 2019, transport vehicles constitute 4.57 per cent and non-transport vehicles constitute 95.43 per cent.

Of the total vehicular population, two-wheelers constituted 84.32 per cent. “The two-wheeler vehicular population is 233.46 lakh,” he said. Among that, motorcycles topped the chart at nearly 1.43 crore while mopeds and scooters stood at 53.78 lakh and 35.76 lakh respectively. There are 25.57 lakh cars in the State.

Compared to the previous year, overall number of vehicles has registered a 7.89 per cent increase in 2018-19, he said.

Listing the government’s efforts to control pollution, he said new vehicles were exempted from obtaining “pollution under control certificate” for one year from the date of registration.

Vijayabhaskar said that the Transport Department was “one of the major revenue earners” for the State government as it collects various taxes and fees. The department earned Rs 5,572 crore as revenue in the financial year 2018-19, he added. “With the rapid increase in the vehicular population every year, the revenue increased from Rs 4,855 crore in 2016-17 to Rs 5,362 in 2017-18,” he said.

Despite the increase in the vehicular population, the Minister said that the accident deaths have reduced by 24.3 per cent in 2018 and accidents have decreased by 2.50 per cent compared to the previous year.

Deaths due to accidents, which stood at 15,061 in 2017, has come down to 11,375 in 2018, he said, adding that as part of the action taken on the drivers causing accidents, licenses of 7,905 drivers were suspended and 238 were cancelled. For drunken driving, he said, 42,600 licenses were suspended and 86 were cancelled.