Kochi: The Kerala High Court has ruled that taxes under the Kerala Motor Vehicles Taxation Act, 1976, will apply to vehicles registered in Bharat series (BH) in the state.

The ruling was given by Justice D K Singh while considering a batch of petitions urging the court’s intervention to allow them to register vehicles under the 'BH' series in Kerala.

The court also directed the transport authorities in Kerala to register the vehicles of plaintiffs under the BH series and collect the taxes under the Kerala Motor Vehicle Taxation Act, 1976.

The advantage of vehicles in the BH series is that they need not be re-registered while taken to other states. However, a vehicle in the ‘KL’ series registered in Kerala has to be transferred to the registration of another state if it plies there for more than a year.

As per rules, employees of Central and state governments and those working in institutions having offices in four or more states can register their vehicles under the BH series. These vehicle owners have to pay taxes for two years. The plaintiffs had approached the court pointing out that authorities in Kerala were not allowing such registration.