MARGAO
When the Margao Municipal Council issued a 15-day public notice to the owners of abandoned vehicles to remove the unused vehicles from the footpaths and roadsides in 2020, the civic body had warned punitive action against the vehicle owners, including seizing the vehicles and auctioning the same on ‘as is where is basis’.
MMC Chief Officer Agnelo Fernandes had gone to the extent of saying the unused vehicles found on the footpath and roadsides are causing inconveniences by being an obstruction, an eyesore and being a danger for the traffic inflow at or near the road crossing or on the footpath or on the edge of the footpath.
Justifying the crackdown, the civic body had quoted Section 122 of the Motor Vehicle Act, 1988, mandating all vehicles found hampering pedestrian movement due to unclaimed, damaged and parked haphazardly by the roadside and obstructing the pedestrian move have to be removed.
That’s not all. The MMC had further contended that Sections 127 and 201 of the Motor Vehicle Act, 1988 is clear that if a motor vehicle is abandoned or unattended for 10 hours or more in a public place, causing impediment or being a barrier to the free flow of traffic, it can be removed by towing service.
The ground reality, however, has not changed for the better since October 2020, with a number of vehicles still lying unclaimed and abandoned along the city roadsides.
