The Delhi Petrol Dealers’ Association filed petitions in the Delhi High Court.
| Photo Credit: File photo
The Delhi High Court on Wednesday asked the Delhi government and the Commission for Air Quality Management in NCR and Adjoining Areas (CAQM) to respond to a plea against orders prosecuting and penalising petrol pump owners for non-compliance with the “no fuel to end-of-life vehicles”.
The petition filed by the Delhi Petrol Dealers Association stated that the orders failed to appreciate that petrol pump owners were “merely private entities operating pumps under licence agreements with respective oil marketing companies, without the power or authority to perform law enforcement duties, essentially directed by State entities”.
Advocates Anand Varma, Adyasha Nanda and Apoorva Pandey, representing the Association, submitted that the dealers were not opposed to the implementation of CAQM’s directions, which restrict fuel supply to ELVs.
“We are aggrieved by the application of Section 192 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 to petrol pump owners,” the counsel said. The Section specifies penalties for driving or allowing the use of an unregistered vehicle.
The plea alleged the arbitrariness in penalising petrol pump owners for sheer inadvertence and at times, for reasons beyond their control.
A petrol pump faces an average footfall of about 3,000 vehicles in a day for purchasing fuel from multiple dispensing units simultaneously and the possibility of inadvertence due to such large volume cannot be ruled out, the plea added.
“However, such inadvertence or inability on their part to comply with the rule, even for reasons beyond their control is being met with a disproportionate and unreasonable penalty of prosecution under Section 192 of Motor,” the plea said.
Published – July 03, 2025 01:33 am IST
