Motorcycles with an engine capacity of 48cc must be registered, the Department of Motor Traffic said on Thursday, rejecting as false the claim by some dealers that small-capacity machines are exempt.
Commissioner General of Motor Traffic Thushara Indunil Fernando, a retired Air Vice Marshal, said at a media briefing that it had been observed that some motorcycle dealers were selling these machines while telling buyers that registration was not required.
That claim is “completely false,” he said, according to Hiru News.
What buyers are being told to do
Anyone buying such a motorcycle should make sure they obtain the proper customs documentation, the Commissioner General said, the Daily Mirror reported.
Riding an unregistered motorcycle on a public road can result in legal action and fines by the police, he warned. The department said the burden falls on the rider, not the dealer who made the claim — a buyer who accepts a dealer’s assurance is the one stopped at the roadside.
The two filings describe the threshold differently
The two reports do not state the engine-capacity rule in the same terms, and the difference is worth noting for anyone trying to work out whether a particular machine is covered.
Hiru puts it as a specific capacity: registration of 48cc motorcycles is mandatory. The Daily Mirror frames it as a range, reporting that motorcycles “with engine capacities of less than 48cc or 50cc” must be registered.
Read together, the point both filings make is the same — that small displacement is not an exemption. Neither filing cites the regulation or the section of the Motor Traffic Act that sets the requirement, so the precise cut-off cannot be confirmed from the reporting.
The 48cc figure is not arbitrary. Engine capacities just under 50cc are a common threshold in other countries for mopeds that attract lighter licensing rules, which is the likely origin of the claim the department is now contradicting.
Not reported
Neither filing says how many unregistered machines are thought to be in use, whether any dealer has been identified or faces action, or whether buyers who already own one can now register it and on what terms. Neither gives the fine a rider would face.
Neither states whether the machines in question are imported under a customs classification that differs from larger motorcycles, which would explain why the department raised documentation specifically.