LAHORE: ‘Internal rifts’ between the staff members of the chief traffic officer (CTO) and the field officials have disrupted the service delivery, with wardens allegedly slowing down the licencing process and leaving the senior citizens waiting for hours in the scorching heat at the centres across the city for the authentication of their fitness certificates.

Some reports suggested that the traffic officials posted at the majority of the licencing and testing centres have abandoned the process of driving licences for the senior citizens (50 and above) visiting there along with mandatory medical fitness certificates issued by the authorised medical practitioners.

The situation got worse when the CTO Lahore suspended from service several traffic officials on the ‘complaints’ of issuing driving licences to the senior citizens on the basis of the ‘bogus medical certificates’.

An official said the traffic wardens alleged that some staff members of the CTO office posted in vigilance centres ‘manipulated’ the complaints by presenting ‘fabricated’ reports in order to target their rivals.

Confusion over medical certificates verification causes delays at licencing centres; spox defends strict licence checks

He said currently 30 Khidmat Marakaz/licencing, testing and facilitation centres are providing services to the citizens in Lahore.

Some of them are operating in Arfa Karim Tower, Liberty Market, Manawan, DHA, Bahria Town, Wapda Town, Ichhra, Garden Town, Kahna, Iqbal Town, Cantt, Railway Station, Raiwind Road, Mozang, Township, etc.

Of the total Marakaz, he said the department has posted doctors at only two centres -- Manawan and Liberty Market -- where they were given tasks to examine the senior citizens and verify their respective medical certificates.

The official said this facility was not made available by the department at all the other centres.

He added that the traffic officials posted at these centres had not been provided with any elaborate system for the verification of the fitness certificates which were issued by the medical practitioners sitting in government hospitals of Lahore.

It was not humanly possible for a warden to determine the authenticity of the signatures and stamps with the original ones through visual inspection alone, which is a form of forensic examination.

The official declared it purely a domain of a forensic expert to identify both the structural and habitual characteristics of handwriting to distinguish authentic signatures from forgeries.

Taking advantage of this situation, the official said the staff deputed at the vigilance cell put up the bogus medical cases of the ‘selective traffic officials’ with the CTO who was recently posted and had no knowledge of the ‘internal politics’ or ‘rift’ within the department.

Similarly, he said, the CTO suspended a dozen other traffic wardens on multiple complaints in the light of the reports generated by the vigilance staff.

Some of them were suspended on the complaints that they were spotted talking to the drivers along the roads, accusing them of accepting bribes.

The official clarified that these wardens had imposed fines on the car riders for violations.

Actually, they were guiding the car riders to pay fines online through the bank app following a ban imposed on cash payments.

He said a majority of the motorists were not aware of the online payment system as traffic fines were to be paid through a digital system using 18-digit Payment System Identifier (PSID).

In some cases, the official said the drivers would take five to seven minutes to understand the online payment.

He alleged that vigilance staff had been exploiting such situations to target rival traffic officials, claiming that a culture of blackmail and bribery by influential vigilance personnel against field staff had persisted in the city traffic police for years.

The official said currently 193 field officials were discharging duties at all the centres of the city including 178 licencing staff members and many of them were facing alleged blackmailing and harassment by certain staff members of the vigilance cell.

Chief Traffic Officer Abdul Raheem Sherazi didn’t respond to the repeated calls and text messages of this reporter.

A spokesperson for the city traffic police department said the wardens were suspended following initial irregularities in medical certificates submitted for commercial driving licences.

He said it was observed that several medical certificates neither carried clear signatures of the concerned doctors nor mentioned valid RMP (Registered Medical Practitioner) numbers. In some cases, the RMP numbers were either incomplete or unclear, making it impossible to properly verify the doctor’s identity and authenticity of the medical certificate.

Furthermore, three medical certificates issued from Mian Munshi DHQ Hospital were recently received in which the doctors’ names, RMP numbers, and official details appeared valid and verified.

However, during physical examination at the licencing centre, the applicants were found to have vision-related issues, including impaired eyesight in one eye, despite being declared medically fit by the doctors.

In light of these concerns, the licencing process has been made more strict and transparent.

“Every medical certificate is now thoroughly verified, including confirmation of the doctor’s RMP number, while applicants are also physically assessed to determine their ability to walk, see, and safely operate a vehicle”, the spokesperson said.

A driving licence is issued only after complete satisfaction and verification by the licencing in-charge, ensuring road safety and protection of human lives, he said.

However, he didn’t talk about the concerns of the traffic wardens regarding the lack of a system to verify the original signatures and stamps of the medical practitioners with the bogus ones and accusation of internal rifts within the department which led to resentment among the field staff.

Published in Dawn, May 13th, 2026