Bhubaneswar, Aug. 19: Online auction of fancy numbers for cars has started getting a good response in the city with the "0001" number fetching a whopping Rs 1.6 lakh as compared to the base price of Rs 1 lakh.

The transport department had identified 61 fancy numbers between 1 and 9999 to be auctioned online instead of the old practice of manual booking.

Sources in the regional transport office, Bhubaneswar-I zone, said that eight parties had submitted online bids for the number 0001 and a city-based shipping company finally got the number with a bid of Rs 1.6 lakh. Another fancy number, 0009, with a base price of Rs 1 lakh, went to an automobile company for Rs 1.01 lakh. The online auction had begun on July 1.

Regional transport officer, Bhubaneswar-I, Lal Mohan Sethy said so far 16 fancy numbers had been allotted through online bidding.

"While five of these numbers were booked by private firms, the rest were booked by individuals. The number 9009 was auctioned for Rs 66,000 as against its base price of Rs 20,000. Another number, 0777, with a base price of Rs 20,000 was auctioned at Rs 93,000. Both these numbers were booked by individuals," said Sethy.

According to the recent notification of state transport department, the minimum base price for 0001 and 0009 has been kept at Rs 1 lakh while the minimum base price for numbers 0002, 0003, 0004, 0005, 0006, 0007, 0008, 0011, 0786, 1111, 1234, 7777 and 9999 has been kept at Rs 60,000. There are 11 other numbers that would be auctioned at a base price of Rs 40,000 and the remaining 35 fancy numbers would be auctioned at Rs 10,000 for two-wheelers and Rs 20000 for other vehicles.

Before the online bidding process, a person had to pay Rs 10,000 to get a fancy number for a two-wheeler, while the cost was Rs 20,000 for a four-wheeler. The process of obtaining a fancy number used to be on a first come, first served basis.

According to a notification of state transport department, the applicant making the highest bid would be allotted the number on production of the vehicle with other documents within 30 days from the filing of the online application. Transport officials said that reservation price paid by unsuccessful applicants would be returned to them within seven days after the auction was over.