My driving license is blocked despite paying speeding fine. Now what?

The physical driving license card was not seized by the officer he returned it to me after noting down the details for providing a challan.

BHPian oilmonkey recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Hello,

I was driving through Goa to Karnataka on a roadtrip where I was stopped by an Traffic police officer for speeding the vehicle. I apologized to the officer then paid the fine and continued my trip.

Details of an incident that happened in Goa are as below:

Offence: S 183 - Driving at speed exceeding the maximum speed fixed for the motor vehicle (LMV) (183)

Scenario: Speed Limit was 60 Kmph and I was driving at 70/75 Kmph. This was the claim made by the traffic police officer as detected by a speed gun. (I was not shown any proof of this however I was travelling and did not want to waste time arguing so paid fine). The challan issue to me states that speed of the vehicle was 70/75 Kmph.

Date of Offence: 30 Jan 23

Fine: 1000

After the above incident, couple of days back while accessing mParivahan app I noticed that my license status is in 'BLOCKED' status. On checking the Parivahan website it shows remark for blocking and it states that license has been blocked as per letter received from Traffic Cell Margao which was sent on 31 Jan 23. However there is no notice, letter or SMS that was sent to me for this blocking. Further, this block was enforced on 7 Jun 23 which is five months after the incident. The physical driving license card was not seized by the officer he returned it to me after noting down the details for providing a challan.

I am aware I need to go to RTO and resolve this but I wanted to put this down here for guidance and awareness of everyone on this forum.

Someone who is aware of this can please guide on the process to unblock the license and why was it blocked in the first place? Is driving a car at 70/75 Kmph when speed limit is 60 Kmph such a big offense

Here's what BHPian Dodge_Viper had to say on the matter:

Unfortunately there are no set rules defined or present anywhere for license suspension I believe. It is sadly at the will of traffic police. I was once stopped for breaking a signal (I didn't cross at red I was halfway through the junction when it turned red). The traffic police who stopped me saw my list of challans and said you have 5-6 challans against your vehicle I ll now suspend your license for 6 months. I had to plead to get out. Post that tried a lot to search for license suspension rules but did not find any.

Guess you don't have any option apart from visiting RTO. But you can try visiting your local traffic police chowki first and check if they can revoke it.

Here's what BHPian anjan_c2007 had to say on the matter:

You were booked for a petty traffic offence and were duly fined. You paid up. "Noone can be punished/fined for any civil or criminal wrong twice, for the same offence." This is taught to a law student as a beginner.

For grave traffic offences including drunk driving (second offence) the driving license is suspended by the issuing RTO office upon recommendation by the traffic police. And the suspension is not for any indefinite period. It is usually three or six months.

You need to approach your local RTO office to check and verify the status and find out whether it has been really blocked. If not suspended, just go out for a long drive with your family or friends to celebrate.

And if it has been blocked, please send a representation by registered/speed post to the RTO citing your grievance, a copy of your licence and a screenshot of its status being shown as blocked. If no reasonable reply or action is taken till 30 days, please send them a legal notice through a good lawyer after which you can move the court for directions to the RTO.

Here's what BHPian thanixravindran had to say on the matter:

I don't think Traffic police have authority to suspend license. They can only recommend license suspension to RTO. Only the RTO have powers to suspend license.

You can appeal against suspension by approaching RTO. If appeal is lost, I guess you can appeal to State Transport Commissioner further.

Here's what BHPian mpksuhas had to say n the matter:

Something similar happened with RC of a friend. While randomly they were checking in Parivahan, noticed that RC is locked due to non payment of speeding ticket at a different state.

They were not aware of the speeding ticket and had missed that. They made the payment online and in some 2 days the blocking was removed by itself.

You can either do that or send the proof of your earlier payment chalan to RTO office mentioned in Parivahan and get it removed.

Check out BHPian comments for more insights and information.