You're reading it here first: State Bank of India, Mercedes, ICICI Lombard and Bajaj Allianz are among the companies which purchased Vahan data, a government database of 25 crore vehicle registration records, managed by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways. 127 private and 15 government entities have bought this data from the ministry, RTI documents obtained by MediaNama show. 30 public and private sector banks, 20 logistics solution providers, 19 finance organisations, 18 insurance organisations and 5 automobile manufacturers form the bulk of these 142 entities. Between 2014-19, the government has pocketed over Rs 68 crore by selling this database; in 2019 alone, it has earned more than Rs 21 crore. Punjab National Bank, Citi Bank, Axis Bank and Yes Bank are among the 30 banks to have bought this data. Automakers like Volkswagen, Toyota and Nissan have also purchased it. BMW India Financial Services and Tata Finance are a few of the finance companies that have bought this data. Here's a year-wise breakdown of the money the government made by selling Vahan data: Year Yearwise Amount received for providing access to information from National Register through Vahan 2014 Rs 600 2015 Rs 1.62 crore 2016 Rs 7.52 crore 2017 Rs 12.56 crore 2018 Rs 25.96 crore 2019 Rs 21.01 crore Here’s the complete list of companies: Serial no Name of Companies accessing information through National Register 1 Abhinav Transport Pvt. Ltd. 2 ACKO General Insurance Limited 3 Adhunik Transport Organization Pvt. Ltd. 4 Affinity Multisevices Pvt. Ltd 5…
