Star ratings for vehicles: Soon, India will have new car assessment program, Bharat New Car Assessment Programme (Bharat NCAP). Under the new mechanism, automobiles in India shall be accorded 'Star Ratings' based upon their performance in crash tests.
The news about the new car assessment program was recently shared by Union minister Nitin Gadkari in a series of tweets. The star ratings will be accorded to the vehicles based upon their performance in crash tests.
Gadkari said the Bharat New Car Assessment Programme (Bharat NCAP) will serve as a consumer-centric platform, allowing customers to opt for safer cars based upon their Star-Ratings, while promoting a healthy competition among original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) in India to manufacture safer vehicles.
"I have now approved the draft GSR notification to introduce Bharat NCAP (New Car Assessment Program), wherein automobiles in India shall be accorded Star Ratings based upon their performance in crash tests," he said.
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The Road Transport and Highways minister stressed that Star Ratings of Indian cars based on crash tests is extremely crucial not only to ensure structural and passenger safety in cars, but to also increase the export-worthiness of Indian automobiles. The testing protocol of Bharat NCAP shall be aligned with global crash-test protocols factoring in the existing Indian regulations, allowing OEMs to get their vehicles tested at India's own in-house testing facilities, Gadkari said. According to him, Bharat NCAP will prove to be a critical instrument in making our automobile industry Aatmanirbhar with the mission of making India the top automobile hub in the world.
Recently, Gadkari said that he is contemplating legislation to curb the practice of wrongly parked vehicles on streets, which often results in the clogging of roads. Once this becomes reality, a person sending photographs of a wrongly parked vehicle may get a reward of Rs 500 in case the fine works out to be Rs 1,000. The minister regretted that the people do not make parking spaces for their vehicles, instead, their vehicles occupy the road.
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