A recent incident of traffic violation has cost a truck owner a staggering Rs 6.53 Lakh of penalty. The Odisha truck owner was slapped the fine by Sambhalpur Regional Transport Office for various offences. What's surprising is that the incident took place much before the implementation of the newly amended Motor Vehicles Act, it is reportedly said the fine was levied in violation of the Old Motor Vehicles Act. The challan amounting to Rs 6,53,100 is the highest traffic penalty in India as of yet.

Read: Delhi Truck Owner Pays A Whopping ₹2 Lakh For Violating New MV Act

RTO issues Rs 6.5 lakh to Odisha truck owner

The truck which was registered in Nagaland was slapped with a challan by the enforcement team of the Transport Office in Sambalpur. The owner has been identified as Shailesh Shankar Lal Gupta of Bethel Colony in Phek Town of Nagaland while the driver Dilip Karta is a resident of Jharsuguda. The RTO issued the fine for driving without road tax and not carrying documents including vehicle insurance. The driver was also issued challan for violating air and noise pollution and carrying passengers on the goods vehicle as well. Apart from this, the vehicle violated permit conditions, reported sources.

Motorists flouting traffic rules have had to pay a significantly higher amount since the Motor Vehicles Amendment Act 2019 came into effect across the country from Sunday, September 1. Just a day later, a Gurugram man on a scooter was fined Rs 23,000 after he was found guilty of violating five traffic rules. On the same day, Gurugram traffic police penalised three auto-rickshaw drivers, charging them Rs 9,400 to Rs 37,000.

In another bizarre incident, it has been reported that a man in Delhi allegedly set his own bike on fire, after he received a challan for violating traffic rules.

Read: Bhubaneswar Auto-driver Gets 47,500 Challan After Gurugram's 23,000

The Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari has defended stricter penalties by stating that it will have a deterrent effect on such cases of traffic violations. He reportedly said that 1,50,000 lives are lost to road accidents every year and that though it is up to state governments to decide whether they want to reduce the fine, he would urge them not to. Further claiming, this should be fine for the ones abiding by the law. Mamata Banerjee denied implementing the act in West Bengal, calling it 'harsh'. However, Gujarat, Maharashtra, and Karnataka have decided to reduce the fines for first-time offenders. 

Read: Maharashtra Min Requests Nitin Gadkari To Reduce High Traffic Fines

Victims of hefty fines

Since the new traffic violations act implementation, a truck driver was levied penalties under the Motor Vehicles (Amended) Act, 2019 which had surpassed all records when he has levied a challan over Rs 2 lakh, near Mukarba Chowk in Delhi. The new traffic violations that came into effect on September 1, have reports of exorbitant amounts of fines being levied on citizens across the nation. On September 1 alone the Delhi police had issued as many as 3,900 challans in one evening. Odisha is among the few states which have started implementing the amended Motor Vehicles Act from September 1 when it came into effect.

Read: Bengaluru Traffic Police Collected Rs. 72 Lakhs As Fines In A Week