PESHAWAR, Feb 20: People in all districts of the NWFP would get computerised driving licences soon, a source told Dawn here on Wednesday.
“The provincial government has asked officials to expedite work on the setting up of the Management Information System (MIS) so that issuance of computerised driving licences could be started in various districts as soon as possible,” said an official in the police department.
He said the concerned authorities had taken serious notice of fake driving licences in different districts where “the revenue was going into the pockets of some officials instead to the public treasury”.
The National Accountability Bureau, Frontier chapter, had also taken notice of the misappropriation and was emphasising upon the computerised process so that the massive corruption could be controlled, he said.
Meanwhile, MIS Deputy Director Khawar Abbas, when contacted, confirmed reports of misappropriation and said that the manual process of issuing driving licences was full of faults.
Mr Abbas said issuance of computerised driving licences started in Peshawar last September and proved very successful. Currently computerised licences are also being issued from Abbottabad and Kohat, and would soon start from Charsadda.
Over 7,000 computerised licences had been issued since September and about 350 cards were being issued on daily basis, he said and claimed that the per month revenue, being generated through the computerised system, was equal to the annual income of the previous manual system.
In the past people used to get driving licences at home without any test, he said, but now the entire method had been changed with introduction of the test system. At least 75 per cent people appearing in the driving tests were unable to pass and they were given next date for re-appearance.
The driving licence system, he said, was centralised in Peshawar but the people could get licences in their respective districts. He said the centralised system would help control issuance of double cards and other mistakes.