To deal with the issue of a large number of erring motorists not paying their e-challan, the Maharashtra Highway Safety Patrol department had approached Maharashtra State Legal Services Authority and Bombay High Court in order to present these cases before a Lok Adalat. (File) A TOTAL of 36 lakh motorists in Maharashtra have been served notice through the local traffic police to remain present before the Lok Adalat on December 11 to pay fines for the pending 1.45 crore e-challan issued to them, which is collectively worth Rs 586.89 crore. Overall, the e-challan fines pending since January 2019 stands at Rs 1,191.76 crore. Those who fail to appear before the Lok Adalat will have to face prosecution in court.
To deal with the issue of a large number of erring motorists not paying their e-challan, the Maharashtra Highway Safety Patrol department had approached Maharashtra State Legal Services Authority and Bombay High Court in order to present these cases before a Lok Adalat. From September this year, the traffic police started serving pre-litigation notices to 10 lakh motorists, asking them to be present before the Lok Adalat to pay up the fines and later managed to recover crores of dues.
A second round of serving the notices started on November 19 and till date 36 lakh motorists have been served notices. Fearing that they will have to be present in Lok Adalat, several thousands of motorists have paid fines worth Rs 34.81 crores while the remaining will have to be present before the court on Saturday.
The motorists are sent a text message which contains a link to download the notice which is in the form of a PDF file. “Those motorists who do not remain present before the Lok Adalat will have to face prosecution by court which means they will have to pay more fine,” said Bhushan Kumar Upadhyay, Additional Director General (Traffic), Maharashtra. The traffic department said they will continue with the exercise of taking the help of Lok Adalat to recover the pending dues.
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