Vehicle Location Tracking Devices and Emergency Buttons Mandatory for all New Public Service Vehicles Registered After 1st January 2019
The Ministry of Road Transport & Highways vide notification dated 25.10.18, has mandated that all new public service vehicles except auto rickshaws and e-Rickshaws, registered on and after 1st January 2019, will have to be equipped with Vehicle Location Tracking ( VLT )with emergency buttons. The VLT device manufacturers would assist in providing the back end services for monitoring. This regulation is being brought in to ensure safety of passengers especially women.
In case of older public service vehicles –those registered up to 31″December, 2018, the respective State/ UT Governments will notify the date by which these vehicles have to install Vehicle Location Tracking Device and Panic Buttons. The Ministry has sent an advisory to the states in this regard.
The Ministry has also notified the operational procedure for implementation of VLT cum Emergency buttons. The State or Union Territories are required to ensure execution of this order and check fitment and functional status of the VLT device in the public service vehicles at the time of checking of the vehicles for fitness certification.
Command and Control Centers will be setup by the State or VLT manufacturers or any other agency authorized by the State Government, and these centers will provide interface to various stakeholders such as state emergency response center, the transport department or Regional Transport Offices, Ministry of Road Transport and Highways and its designated agencies, device manufacturers and their authorized dealers, testing agencies, permit holders, etc. These centers will also provide feed to the VAHAN data base or the relevant data base of the State with regard to the over speeding, device health status.
The details of each VLT device will be uploaded on the VAHAN database by the VLT device manufacturer using its secured authenticated access. The VLT device manufacturers or their authorized dealers will install the VLT devices in public service vehicles and register the devices along with details of vehicle on the corresponding backend systems inreal-time.
The public service vehicle owners have to ensure that the VLT devices installed in their vehicles are in working condition and regularly send required data to the corresponding backend system through cellular connectivity.
