Green card for autos is here

Green card for autos is here
Only 4-Stroke Vehicles Welcome
Deepa Bhasthi | TNN

Bangalore: What the state does not want will, in all probability, be passed on to other states. The two-stroke autorickshaws in stock (about 500), after the transport department ordered their gradual phasing out from Karnataka’s roads, are likely to be diverted for sale to other states by the dealers.
In what is likely to have longterm environmental implications, the Karnataka state transport department has notified that no new autos with twostroke engines will henceforth be registered in the state.
The August notification ordered that only those autos which are fitted with four-stroke engines will be registered.
Transport officials said there are around 500 such autos in stock in the state. About 50% of these have been temporarily registered, meaning that the transport department has to accommodate them and permanently register them.
The average life of an auto being anywhere between 10-15 years, the existing autos will eventually be phased out. The issue remains, however, as to what the dealers are to do with the existing stock of two-stroke engine autos.
While they are learnt to have given representations to the government as to what could be done, it is believed that there is no way but to divert the stock to be sold in other states.
PAINT ROW
Further issues complicate the smooth transition from polluting autos to green vehicles, that the department had expected. The major one is, of course, the green paint issue which was also at the heart of a recent auto strike in the city.
Transport commissioner Bhaskar Rao told The Times of India that four-stroke autos would have to be further painted green to identify them as environmentally-friendly vehicles. The day-long strike resulted in the government giving the drivers a year’s extension of deadline to paint the autos green.
This apart, 13 cities in the state will have to have fourstroke engine autos along with LPG fitment.
The rest need to mandatorily have only four-stroke autos, nuances of the government order that unions and auto drivers are getting confused over. The cities include Bangalore, Mysore, Davanagere, Gulbarga, Dharwad, Puttur and Udupi.
A two-stroke engine auto is sold at Rs 1.10 lakh while an auto fitted with four-stroke engine costs Rs 13,000 more.
Karnataka is the first state in the country to take a step in making autos more environmentally friendly.