NAGPUR NEWS:-RTO office soon at east Nagpur

RTO office soon at east Nagpur

NAGPUR: The state government has finally approved the long-pending proposal of a deputy regional transport office (Dy RTO) office in east Nagpur. The government issued an order to this effect on August 24.

For the new office, 35 new posts have been sanctioned, including one each of deputy RTO and assistant RTO, four posts of motor vehicle inspectors and three of assistant motor vehicle inspectors.

The transport department was planning one more regional transport office in the city to cater to the growing vehicular population. The proposal was mooted for the convenience of people and to ease congestion at the transport department office.

Talking to TOI, RTO Vijay Lande said that the vacant bus depot land in Small Factory area on Old Bhandara Road has been proposed for new office. The state government has sanctioned Rs 54.98 lakh which will be allocated in winter session of state assembly at Nagpur for the said project. Geographically, the eastern side of the railway line that passes through city will be the jurisdiction of new transport office.

The city RTO deals with over 11 lakh vehicles as on date. Close to 400 vehicles a day are added to the city streets every day, said Lande. He further said that the RTO issues 150 permits to goods and passenger carrier vehicles, 300 permanent driving licences, 400 learners licences and 10 international driving licences per day.

Lande said, "With the new office, getting a learners licence, permanent licence and other RTO related work will become easier for east Nagpurians. A computerized test facility will also be set up."

For the computerization, the state government has earmarked Rs 2.46 crore for the project, implementation of which has already begun in 14 RTOs including Mumbai Central, Andheri, Thane, Kalyan, Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg, Raigad and some others. It will be expanded to 10 more RTOs including Nagpur and east Nagpur.

East Nagpur MLA Krishna Khopde was pursuing the matter since last two years. He had raised the issue through a call attention motion in the state assembly on March 29, 2010. Initiating action on the long pending proposal, state government has sanctioned two such offices in state, one at east Nagpur and another in chief minister Prithviraj Chavan's constituency Karad in Satara district.

Talking to TOI, Khopde said, "The present RTO office was set up in the city when population was around 3 lakh. Now the city's population has crossed almost 25 lakh and vehicles has crossed the figure of 10 lakh. The present RTO office was falling short of catering to the needs of people. Hopefully, the new office will ease some of that pressure."