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GMDA to tow illegally parked vehicles, charge steep fee in Gurugram

Hindustan Times, Gurugram | ByHT Correspondent
Sep 12, 2019 11:34 AM IST

The shift from the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG) to the GMDA—which will manage it through an app—will make towing less prone to corruption and would be a step forward in streamlining the city’s parking policy.

Starting this week, at the behest of the traffic police, the Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) will take over the duties of towing away illegally parked vehicles and levy charges on violators.

Officials said the shift from the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG) to the GMDA—which will manage it through an app—will make towing less prone to corruption and would be a step forward in streamlining the city’s parking policy, which now comes under the GMDA’s mandate of improving mobility in Gurugram.

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In addition to the penalty levied by the traffic police under the Motor Vehicles Act—500 for wrongful parking—the GMDA will levy as towing charges 2,000 for heavy vehicles with more than 10 tyres, 1,000 for heavy-, medium-sized and all other commercial vehicles, 500 for light vehicles and 200 for two-wheelers.

While the MCG was earlier levying the same charges, the GMDA said it will be implementing them more stringently.

“Earlier, the process was completely offline. Now, there is an internal app which will manage the service in real time. We were receiving some complaints of deviation from protocol by the earlier contractors. Sometimes, violators were not given challans. The scope for corruption will reduce now,” Himanshu Garg, GMDA additional chief executive officer (mobility) and DCP (traffic) said, adding that the transfer was undertaken at the traffic police’s request.

The traffic police have been in talks with the GMDA for some time on how to address the loose regulation of towing services. New contractors, who will receive 30% revenue share from the towing charges, have been empanelled and are expected to begin work in a day or two.

While the provisions to penalize violators under the amended Motor Vehicles Act have sparked caution among motorists due to the steep penalties, wrongful parking, which still draws a fine of a comparatively modest sum of 500, is rampant across Gurugram, traffic police officials said.

Sandeep Tiwari, a beat constable stationed in Sikanderpur, said, “We have seen some behavioural changes in motorists when it comes to wearing helmets, wrong-side driving, wearing seat belts and so on. People are scared of paying heavy fines. But illegal parking is taken very lightly. We have been told that action will be stepped up once the GMDA deploys its own towing cranes this week.”

Garg also said that the GMDA is working on a plan to create a healthy density of multilevel parking facilities across the city, but did not provide specific details. “Land acquisition was the main issue under the MCG, but the GMDA is now looking at the land under its ownership for the same. There is an urgent need to create more parking space in the city,” he added.

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