Correspondent
Shillong: In a bid to reduce air pollution, cut fuel imports, and promote eco-friendly recycling, the Meghalaya Cabinet on Thursday approved the state’s Vehicle Scrappage Policy, marking a major step toward greener mobility. Highlighting the decision, MDA spokesperson and Cabinet Minister Paul Lyngdoh confirmed that approximately 13,000 vehicles will be removed from the roads in the first phase of implementation.
“First, we are taking off government vehicles which are 15 years and older,” Lyngdoh said. “This will roughly mean around 5,000 government vehicles will come under this scrappage policy and therefore will be off the roads.”
On private vehicles, he stated, “We have decided to first implement by limiting this policy only to vehicles which are 35 years and older. Altogether there are roughly 8,000 such vehicles.”
The combined removal of these government and private vehicles—5,000 and 8,000 respectively—brings the total to 13,000 aging vehicles to be scrapped under the new framework.
“The major benefit of having this policy is to allow the government to reduce pollution levels, emission, reduce fuel import—which means less extraction—and recycling of materials,” Lyngdoh added.
With Shillong currently accounting for nearly 2,76,262 registered vehicles, followed by Tura and Jowai, the government aims to phase out outdated and environmentally inefficient vehicles while balancing the economic conditions of the population.
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