PA passes bill to make provision for smart cards to register vehicles

The Sindh Assembly on Wednesday passed the Provincial Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Bill 2020 to replace the conventional book as proof of registration of vehicles with a special security-featured smart card.

If the bill is enacted after the governor’s assent, the government would have to introduce smart cards to register the vehicles in the province. The bill was tabled in the house by Sindh Parliamentary Affairs Minister Mukesh Kumar Chawla who also holds the portfolio of the excise and taxation department, responsible for the registration of vehicles.

The bill proposed amendments to the Motor Vehicles Ordinance 1965 to create the provision in the existing motor vehicles registration law for the security-featured smart card as a means to register the vehicles. The fourth clause of the amendment bill states: “Certificate of registration means and includes the Security Featured Motor Vehicle Registration Smart Card issued by the competent authority to effect that a motor vehicle has been registered.”

The statement of objects and reasons of the bill states: “In the existing provisions of the Provincial Motor Vehicles Ordinance 1965, the term of certificate of registration has been defined. As now the Provincial Vehicle Registration Smart Card, the existing definition of certificate of registration needs to be modified and to include therein the Security Featured MVR Smart Card, therefore, it is expedient to amend the law suitably.”

Speaking on the bill, the excise and taxation minister said the provincial government was going to introduce the new chip-based smart card in place of the conventional registration books in order to take advantage of technological advancements in the

registration of the motor vehicles.

He said the new smart cards for the registration of motor vehicles would be easy to handle by the vehicle owners compared to the conventional registration books as these cards would carry all the relevant information regarding the registered vehicles and theirs owners.

The provincial minister, however, did not mention any time frame in the house for the introduction of the new registration mechanism.