Odd-even back after 3 years, Delhi holds its breath

New Delhi: After three years, Delhi is all set to keep its date with the third edition of the odd-even road rationing scheme from Monday.

For 12 days, odd-numbered vehicles will be allowed on Delhi roads on odd dates and even-numbered vehicles will be allowed on even dates. The scheme will not be implemented on November 10 (Sunday) and the restrictions will also apply to the vehicles with registration numbers of other states.

The scheme comes as an extreme measure at a time when the city is witnessing severe air pollution.

As per the scheme, private diesel, petrol, and CNG run cars will remain off the roads for five days if their number plates end with an even number and vehicles with number plates ending with an odd number will be off the roads for six days.

Like its previous editions, all women and two-wheelers, which form the bulk of all vehicles in the national capital, will remain exempt from the scheme. But CNG run private vehicles have been kept outside the exemption list.

Cars with children in school uniform and those involved in medical emergencies have also been exempted.

When asked how law enforcement agencies are going to deal with those parents who are coming back after dropping their children or while going to pick them from schools in the afternoon, a senior official said, “They will be let off only on the basis of trust.”

He said that even cars driven or occupied by differently-abled people have been exempted.

The government, on its part, is taking a series of measures to make the scheme a major success. The administration will be engaging 2,000-odd private buses to augment the public transport system. The Delhi Metro will also carry out 61 additional trips across its network.

For effective implementation of the scheme, more than 5,000 civil defence volunteers will be deployed at 200 locations all over the city. Over 700 officials would be deployed at these locations as “challan teams.”

The traffic police will be out on the roads in full strength to ensure that motorists follow the scheme. Head constables and officers of higher ranks in the traffic police, sub-divisional magistrates, tehsildars, ATIs, and high-ranked officials of the DTC have been authorised to issue challans to the violators.

Those flouting the odd-even rules can face penalty of '4,000. But a challan for violation of Section 115 of the Motor Vehicles Act can be issued only once. Even the violators will be able to park at a designated area or at the Metro stations.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and his Cabinet colleagues are also covered under the road-rationing scheme. The vehicles of the President, vice president, Prime Minister, Union ministers, governors, Lok Sabha Speaker, Chief Justice of India, and apex court judges are among those who have been exempted.