Rs 500 Reward For Sharing Photo Of Wrongly Parked Vehicle, Nitin Gadkari Talks About 'New Law Soon'

Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari, on June 16, announced — seemingly in jest — plans to "bring in a new law" by which a ₹500 reward will be given to anyone who snaps and shares photos of wrongly parked vehicles.

"If ₹1,000 is the fine for a person guilty of the wrong parking, then ₹500 from that amount will go to the person who clicks the picture," Gadkari stated, chuckling along with the gathering at an event called Industrial Decarbonization Summit 2022 in Delhi.

It was not immediately clear whether a legislative framework indeed backs the minister's comment or not.

Easy Rewards For Citizens?

The Transport Minister's comments came after laying out the context that wrong parking is "a huge menace" due to the number of cars going up in urban India. "There are sometimes cars for each member of a family. But no one is building parking spaces. In Delhi, for instance, wide roads are being treated as parking spaces," Gadkari was quoted as saying by a report in NDTV.

The 65-year-old also added that his house in Nagpur has a 12-car parking space and does not park on the road at all. He also shared a video clip of his address to the summit on his YouTube account.

The transport minister further stated that public transport using electric vehicles is "essential" for the country amid the concerningly growing pollution issues. While giving an example about the US, he said that even sanitation workers have cars there, and soon India will also have a similar situation as everyone is buying cars.

Growing Car Sales In India

In India, car sales have seen a significant spike recently after a steep fall in numbers amid the COVID pandemic. Passenger vehicle dispatches to dealers rose more than two-fold in May 2022 in the country in May 2022, compared to the low numbers in the COVID-hit May of 2021.

According to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), passenger vehicle wholesales went up to 2.5 lakh units during May 2022, compared to below 1 lakh units in last year's May. These numbers include cars and other vehicles, barring two and three-wheelers as well.

Meanwhile, overall sales of passenger vehicles, two-wheelers and three-wheelers went up by 15 lakh units during May of this year compared to below 5 lakh in the same month of 2021.

Also Read: 'Nepali Not Indian Language': All India Women Conference's Remark At Triggers Outrage