PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa excise and taxation department has planned to launch a system allowing automobile owners to retain number plates even after selling their vehicles.

Officials insist the initiative will help increase tax collections, check the use of vehicles in anti-state activities and trace vehicle owners.

The department proposed amendments to the Motor Vehicle Ordinance, 1965, for the purpose through a bill tabled in the provincial assembly by excise and taxation minister Khaliqur Rehman last Friday.

A senior official of the excise department told Dawn that introduction of the proposed “personalised registration marks” would eliminate self-made number plates and the use of open transfer letters for vehicle sale and purchase, a practice that had encouraged the parking of illegal wealth in the automobile market.”

Officials insist move to boost revenues, check illegal activities

The draft bill defines PRM as a number plate or any other shape, type or document, assigned to the owner of a motor vehicle, containing alphanumeric characters or symbols, as specified by the department,” he said.

The official said after the launch of the programme, PRM would be assigned to the vehicle owner instead of the vehicle.

He said as the vehicle was sold, it would lose that mark, leaving its new owner to apply for a new registration mark.

“PRMs will remain with sellers for applying them to their next vehicles,” he said.

The official said the system was also in the works in other provinces and the Islamabad Capital Territory.

Section 25-A of the draft bill states, “The registration authority during the process of a registration shall allot a personalised registration mark to the owners of a motor vehicle. Separate personalised registration marks shall be issued to an owner having more than one motor vehicle.”

Under Section 25-A(2), the personalised registration mark shall stand deactivated as soon as the owner has sold the vehicle, till the request for activation by the owner for applying it to another motor vehicle has been received by the registration authority.

“An owner may retain a deactivated personalised registration mark, subject to yearly biometric verification, which may be retained by the owner for a period of three years without applying it to a motor vehicle. At the expiry of three years, the personalised registration mark shall stand cancelled and the owner shall surrender the number plates to the original registering authority.”

The proposed amendments also said PRM holders could voluntarily surrender their registration mark by submitting an application to the original registering authority.

The draft bill’s Section 25A(8) said all registered number plates, issued or allotted, prior to the enactment of the Provincial Motor Vehicles Ordinance (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) (Amendment) Act, 2025, would be considered PRM, while chassis numbers of those vehicles would be taken as vehicle identification number, with applicability of all the provision of this ordinance.

The official said the new registration system offered a wide range of benefits and had the potential to address loopholes in the current registration regime, which promoted the use of self-made number plates, automobile sale and purchase on open transfer letters, and the parking of illegal money in the vehicle industry.

“This PRM initiative is a progressive move, which aligns with the best global practices. It offers several benefits for law and order, revenue generation and public convenience,” he said.

The official said the new system encouraged the lawful sale of vehicles and pushed owners to intimate motor registration authorities about any deal.

“The new scheme will discourage use of fake number plates or cloned vehicles. And in case of any criminal and terrorist activity, tracking the real owner of a vehicle will be quite possible. Moreover, it will render the vehicles’ open transfer letters ineffective with immediate effect,” he insisted.

The official said since number plates were linked to vehicle owners and not vehicles, law-enforcement agencies would be able to track criminals more efficiently.

He said the scheme would reduce number plate cloning and enhance traffic enforcement through CCTV and automatic number plate recognition.

“One of the most significant impacts of the initiative will be to curtail the safe parking of illegal wealth in the vehicle market. The inherent push within the system will force the real owner to be linked against a vehicle, blocking one major avenue for tax evasion,” he said.

The official said for the success of the scheme, all law-enforcement agencies had to join hands to ensure that only those vehicles are allowed to ply the roads that displayed the number plates duly issued by authorities.

Published in Dawn, August 24th, 2025