Supreme Court orders pilot linking fuel sales to third-party insurance for uninsured vehicles

The Supreme Court instructed the centre to develop a pilot that would deny fuel to vehicles lacking valid third-party insurance, aiming to curb the high uninsured rate on Indian roads.

In a Tuesday hearing, the Supreme Court observed that roughly 56% of vehicles on Indian roads lack third-party insurance, amounting to 16.54 crore uninsured units. The bench of Justices Sanjay Karol and Prashant Kumar Mishra directed the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India, together with the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, to craft a pilot project that would refuse fuel at petrol pumps until owners secure the required insurance, employing Automatic Number Plate Recognition technology.

The court noted the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas has no objection to the proposal. It also ordered an extension of the statutory insurance term for newly purchased vehicles to four years for cars and six years for two-wheelers, with IRDAI to issue immediate guidelines. Further measures include deploying ANPR cameras in selected states, integrating them with data from the Insurance Information Bureau and the VAHAN portal, and equipping state police with devices or apps for real-time insurance verification and e-challan issuance. The directives aim to improve compliance with Section 146 of the Motor Vehicles Act and protect accident victims from prolonged litigation.