Chennai: The Madras High Court on Tuesday upheld a December 2017 Central government notification directing all the States and Union Territories to prohibit the use of crash guards and bull bars in motor vehicles.
After recording the submission of the Tamilnadu government that it had accepted the Centre’s instructions and started cracking down on vehicles fitted with crash guards and bull bars, the First Bench of Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice P D Audikesavalu ordered that the implementation should be universal without any exemption to vehicles of ‘so called important persons.’
The Judges, while disposing of two PILs that insisted on effective implementation of the Centre’s 2017 notification, said they could take judicial notice of drivers of vehicles fitted with crash guards and bull bars behave like ‘bullies’ on roads, especially on the State and National highways.
Observing that the Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways appeared to have issued the notification in public interest, the Judges said the courts would normally not interfere in such notifications unless they were absurd or objectionable.
