Supreme Court Allows Only 10% Of BS-IV Inventory To Be Sold, Post Lockdown

Friday: A small relief for auto dealers, the Supreme Court on Friday allowed the sale of 10 per cent of unsold BS-IV inventory, All BSIV vehicles sold have to be registered within 10 days post the lockdown, except in Delhi and National Capital Region (NCR). The Supreme Court has already directed that no BS-IV vehicle will be sold or registered from April 1, 2020.

Justice Arun Mishra observed: Need to be empathetic towards protecting the environment.  Can't keep extending BS-VI deadline in name of Corona Virus.

Federation of Automobile Dealers’ Associations (FADA), which represents over 26,000 dealerships had asked SC for an extension of 30 days to exhaust BS-IV inventory as vehicles worth over Rs 7,000 crore are still unsold.

Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) on 16th of March had filed an application in the Supreme Court seeking sale and registration of BS-IV vehicles till March 31, 2020.

Earlier, automobile dealers of 4wheelers and 2wheelers had expressed fear that they would not be able to liquidate the BS-IV inventory before the month-end deadline due to the RTOs of various states being shutdown and vehicles in transit being stuck owning to the country wide lockdown to stop the Corona Virus spread. The buyer sentiment also on the lowest with the fear of coronavirus is keeping buyers away from showrooms.

In the current circumstances, any unsold BS-IV vehicle would end up as scrap after March 31. Or the dealers could register some of these and then resell them later. From April 1, only BS-VI compliant vehicles will be registered in the country.

FADA approaches Supreme Court