Hyderabad: Schools in a soup over vehicle fitness penalty

Hyderabad: With the implementation of the new Central Act of Rs 50 daily penalty and just a few days left for the new academic year to begin, many private school managements are still struggling to renew their fitness certificate for school buses, as a late fee is burdening them.

The Telangana Recognised School Managements Association (TRSMA) requested the Transport department to wave off the late fee fine for the renewal of the fitness certificate. According to school management officials, due to Covid-19 pandemic for almost 18 months, all the schools were closed due to which school buses were also halted on the respective school premises.

As many students opted for personal transport after the reopening of the schools in September last year, school buses were off roads. Hence most of the school buses did not apply for renewal of their fitness certificate for 2021-22. Even after all these situations, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways issued a penalty of Rs 50 a day if anyone fails to obtain fitness certificates.

Y Shekar Rao, president of TRSMA, said, "Charging late fee is not ethical as for almost 18 months schools were closed due the pandemic. Without fitness certificates we cannot run the buses, there are around 22,000 educational institution buses that were off roads for nearly 18 months and even after the reopening of the educational institutions, school owners kept the school buses in the parking lot without using them for transportation of students due to severe hardships and financial losses.

Despite the Central government has given the order for extension of validity of documents of all vehicles for one year from April 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021, the Transport department is imposing late fee fine of Rs 50 per day which is mounting about Rs 36,000 per bus. Due to prolonged closure, schools are in financial crisis and are unable to pay their dues.

Shiva Ramkrishna , correspondent of St. Sai High School, said, "It is not the right way to collect Rs 50 per day as a late fee fine and road taxes are levied even for the period when the buses are not in use. The Central government had extended the validity of documents, but transport officials were adopting unscrupulous methods, forcing us to pay the penalty even for an extended period. If the State government do not wave off late fee for renewal of fitness certificate, we have planned to file a petition in the High Court."