The Supreme Court had on October 12 announced an Environment Compensation Charge to be imposed on commercial vehicles entering Delhi.
The Supreme Court today agreed to hear on December 10 a plea of a consortium which levies toll on behalf of Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) from commercial vehicles entering Delhi, that the civic body be restrained from encashing its bank guarantee allegedly due to drop in tax collection.
A bench comprising Chief Justice TS Thakur and Justice R Banumathi asked SMYR Consortium LLP to serve the copy of its plea to amicus curiae and the counsel for the MCD while fixing the matter for hearing next Thursday.
Senior advocate Shyam Divan, appearing for the toll collector, said that due to imposition of court-mandated 'Environment Compensation Charge' (ECC) on commercial vehicles entering Delhi, the number such vehicles have gone down by 30 per cent and has led to drop in civic cess collection.
The MCD, on the ground of drop in cess collection, is wrongly resorting to encash bank guarantee of the consortium, he said while seeking urgent hearing of its plea.
Earlier, the consortium had moved the court alleging that besides municipal toll, it has been given additional burden to collect the court-mandated 'ECC' from commercial vehicles entering Delhi. It had also alleged that it was not heard.
The court had refused to entertain the plea and had rather said that it will not change a word of the order asking the toll collector to levy ECC, ranging from Rs 700 to Rs 1300 on commercial vehicles, as it was for saving Delhi residents.
The court had on October 12 announced an ECC of Rs 700 and Rs 1,300 ECC to be imposed on commercial vehicles entering Delhi from November 1.
It had held that the order would remain operational for four months till February 29, 2016 on an "experimental basis".
It had directed the Delhi government to issue an appropriate notification in this regard and said that passenger buses, vehicles carrying essential commodities, food articles and ambulances would be exempted from paying ECC.
Taking note of the Centre for Science and Environment's study that about 23 per cent of the commercial vehicles and 40-60 per cent of the heavy trucks entering the city were not destined for Delhi, the court had said it was necessary to impose the charges, along with the MCD toll, to equalise the difference in cost in travelling through alternative routes.