National
Anti-graft body to quiz driving licence vendor over plaints
The Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority has issued a public notice asking officials at the Madras Securities Printers about the quality of electronic driving licence cards.Prithvi Man Shrestha
The Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority has issued a public notice asking officials at the Madras Securities Printers about the quality of electronic driving licence cards.
After it received several complaints regarding inferior quality of these so-called smart driving licence cards, the CIAA asked the representatives of Madras Securities based in Chennai, India, to report to its office in Kathmandu within 10 days.
Gokarna Prasad Upadhyay, information officer at the transport office, said the firm has supplied 1.1 million electronic licence cards to the Department of Transport Management so far.
“Complaints have been filed against those licence cards that the firm had issued under the first contract signed in 2013,” he said. “Around 750,000 cards have already been distributed while 500,000 cards are yet to be printed”
According to CIAA Spokesperson Rameshwor Dangal, the public notice was issued as it could not serve a summons to the Madras Securities earlier.
“If the company fails to comply with the notice, the consequences will be determined as per the law,” he said.
For the second phase of the driving licence project, the government has commissioned the country-based Malika Incorporated to print details on the cards supplied by Madras Securities. A contract to this end was signed in October. Around 600,000 applicants are waiting for the electronic cards. Many of them passed the driving test last year.
They have been driving using receipts issued by the transport office.