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| No applicant gets plastic driving licence during last three months | | Shortage of stationery items impedes work at RTO | | Rakesh Sambyal
Kathua, Oct 11: The Regional Transport Office (RTO) Kathua has been hit by shortage of stationery and other related documents for a long time now, leaving thousands of applicants in lurch, especially those who have to come from hilly and far off tehsils of the district.
The shortage of stationery items has also hampered the process of issuing driving licences and other documents and in the last three months, no licence applicant has been issued plastic-card driving licence.
Sources informed Early Times that the Transport department officials had stopped issuing driving licences for the last three months, following severe shortage of stationery and other required material.
"There has been a huge pendency of fresh driving licences which has resulted into great inconvenience to the public. The department is aware with the situation but it is in deep slumber for months. Now the process of procurement of fresh stock of stationery and other related documents has been caught in the bureaucratic redtapism," sources said.A driving license seeker, Madan Lal from Basohli regretted, "When I visited the RTO office Kathua, after a journey of two and a half hours on Thursday, for the third time, I got the same reply that the department was running short of stationery items and I must wait for next few days. I qualified the driving test about three months back but the authorities are yet to issue me valid plastic card licence." He further said that it was the responsibility of Transport department to ensure surplus stationery to avoid chaos and crisis. "I don't know how much I have to suffer to get my driving licence", Sharma said, adding that besides the RTO should deploy additional staff to clear the pending cases. Rohit Mehra and Raj Kumar from Billawar Tehsil, other visitors at Regional Transport further said that there has been a great confusion as no official was aware as to when they would get the stationery to issue the driving licences. "The state government should hold the officials responsible who have failed to procure sufficient stationery in advance. It has subjected a large number of people to great inconvenience.
Besides, the RTO does not have sufficient office staff and inspectors", they said."The visitors have to wait in queues for long to get fitness certificates for their vehicles and to deposit fee for driving licences, which is simply the wastage of time and money" he said. Admitting the fact, the RTO Kathua Ajay Sharma said that for a few months they have been managing the affairs through the available stock, but the department was presently running short of stationery. "We procure stationery from the transport office and there too is no stock. It's not only the District Kathua but 22 other District RTO's are also facing the same problem. As soon as we get the required stationery material the people will start getting driving licences," he said. |
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