Hyderabad: The Road Transport Authority has parked about 1,500 seized vehicles at 28 RTC depots in the city, and will need to pay a sizeable bill for their parking. The RTC charges Rs 5 as parking charge per vehicle for 24 hours. It works out to Rs 1,825 per year for each vehicle, and Rs 27.37 lakh for 1,500 vehicles. Some of the vehicles have been lying in the depots from 2007-08.
“Officials are working out details of when each vehicle was parked, and how much parking charges would be applicable on each vehicle,” said a senior official in the RTA. The RTA has a plan to raise money: It intends to auction the vehicles. Joint transport commissioner T. Raghhunath said, “The RTC is writing letters stating that most of the space in their depots has been occupied by seized vehicles. We have issued notices to the owners to take their vehicles after paying the fine or else the vehicles would go under the hammer.”
A senior official said the RTA would pass on the parking charges fully or partially to the owners who come to recover their vehicles, or the bidders who win the vehicles in auctions. To get the RTA to move out, the RTC is proposing a five-fold hike in parking charges at its depots. “There is a proposal to hike the parking fee per vehicle from '5 to '25 per day,” an RTC officer said, and added, “At least this would ensure that vehicles are auctioned every three months.”
TSRTC executive director A. Purushotham Naik, who heads the corporation’s city region, said the RTA began parking seized vehicles at RTC depots after a joint operation 10 years ago. “The RTA offices were full of seized vehicles and it was decided to park them at RTC depots. The RTC managing director had agreed for it then. Today, there is no space to park buses,” he said. RTC officials wanted the RTA to draw up guidelines to auction unclaimed vehicles every three months. “The practice of ‘seize, park at RTC depot and forget’ should change,” an official said.
