Traffic police shelved a project to issue driving licenses through mobile vans after wasting millions of rupees on a project that was inaugurated with big fanfare at Karachi Press Club in 2013 by the Inspector of Sindh Police.
Traffic authorities said they had already cancelled the mobile van service for issuing learners’ driving licenses which was inaugurated a few years ago in the metropolis.
The basic idea to issue the learners’ licenses through a mobile van service is against traffic laws. A driving license is not a national identity card which can only be kept in pocket but it is government’s permission for driving vehicles on roads so it must be followed by proper procedures, said Traffic Police (Licensing & Training) DIG Aftab Pathan on Monday while talking to PPI.
He said issuing a driving license required various tests and assessment of medical fitness that could not be done in a mobile van.
The DIG said no one would be allowed to violate traffic laws in the city as they were brining 100 percent transparency in issuance of driving licenses through an official procedure of acquiring it.
The mobile van service drive was inaugurated by Inspector General of Police, Sindh Ghulam Hyder Jamali in 2013. It was sponsored by a private company. The main objective of the mobile vans was said to issue learners’ licenses to students and corporate sector people at their doorsteps in streets, universities and business centers through the mobile vans to cater for the driving license needs of the city of twenty million people.
However, the drive for which mobile vans and other equipment were purchased at reportedly high costs was stopped one year ago due to a fault that ‘occurred in the linkage system of the mobile service’.
Replying to a question, Pathan said there was no need of issuing licenses through a van service in Karachi as there were already three branches of the license department that were enough to issue learner and full driving licenses to citizens following proper procedure. He said that traffic law did not allow them to start such a mobile service for learner licenses which could not meet the legal requirements.
However, no satisfactory answer was found for why the mobile van license project was planned, inaugurated and ran while it was against the very basic traffic rules and procedures regarding issuing driving licenses. There was also no answer as to how much money was wasted in this failed project and what action was being taken against those involved in this wastage of taxpayers’ money.