The Excise and Taxation Punjab has not yet succeeded to deliver the smart cards and vehicle registration number plates to the customers for almost a year now.
According to the details, there are more than 65,000 smart cards and over 50,000 registration number plates on the pending list of the Excise and Taxation department, Rawalpindi. As per the officials of the department, there is no delay on their behalf as they are yet to receive smart cards and registration plates from Lahore’s E&T office. Most of the orders till August 2019 have been fulfilled by the Punjab Excise while a majority of the orders after this date are yet to be delivered to the concerned office. The customers are furious about this issue as they have already paid all the respective dues of the process to the government. The customers have even visited the E&T office multiple times to inquire about their smart cards and registration plates but faced disappointment. Reportedly, the Excise and Taxation Rawalpindi has also written various letters to the government of Punjab in this reference but not succeeded in getting their issue resolved.
The government of Punjab initiated smart cards instead of conventional registration books in the later part of 2018 but since then it has been mismanaged by the authorities. The significant delay in issuing smart cards and registration plates has also resulted in affecting the revenue collection by the department. The department has failed to achieve its revenue generation targets due to this particular reason. The situation isn’t any different in other parts of Punjab as well.
Overall, there is a shortfall of nearly 2 million smart cards and more than 7 million registration plates across the province of Punjab. The public, on the other hand, is facing serious issues while commuting because the traffic police are keen to impound vehicles without registration plates and smart cards. Despite showing the valid slip issued from the E&T department, hundreds of vehicle owners have still been issued challans over this matter which has made the situation even worse, reports a local media outlet.
Due to the non-issuance of official government number plates, the general public is forced to use the private number plates which are not tolerated by the traffic police. At least the government should notify the traffic police regarding the pertaining issue to avoid inconvenience for the general public. It is worth mentioning here that the sales of vehicles have gone down considerably in the last six months thus resulting in comparatively fewer orders for smart cards and registration plates. The government of Punjab is still unable to meet the low demand for unknown reasons. The concerned department should take the matter seriously without any further delay to give relief to the public who are at the receiving end of the current situation.
See what Suneel Sarfaraz Munj has to say on this issue (see the video from 18:42):
See the video from 11:20:
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Government institutions are deliberately out there to loot the citizens. They make the law to affix the proper number plate and they make the law about challan. Then they loot the public by taking full registration fees in advance and yet do not issue the number plates. And the public gets looted again when they (public) are challaned because these govt officers are so out of touch with the reality.