Name and shame touts at RTOs

NEW DELHI: Harassed by touts at the regional transport office? You can now click pictures or videos of touts roaming around RTOs and send them to a new anti-tout helpline or the email ID of the transport department.
The presence of touts at RTOs and the alleged connivance of transport officials has become a new flash point between AAP government and bureaucracy. On July 17, chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and transport minister Kailash Gahlot carried out a surprise inspection at the Burari Transport Authority. Kejriwal claimed that the authority had become a den of corruption.

This was followed by a spat between Gahlot and transport commissioner Varsha Joshi during a briefing for assembly questions recently. Joshi recently took to the social media to list measures taken in the last year to weed out corruption from the department. Over the last two weeks, the transport commissioner has also been carrying out surprise inspections at the 13 RTOs in the city. On Thursday, Joshi visited the Burari transport authority and ordered a slew of measures to stop touts from entering the authority.

“We have put up prominent boards at all RTOs displaying the new helpline number 7042567733 and e-mail ID dcops05@gmail.com where people can send pictures or videos of touts. Each complaint will be reported directly to the transport commissioner and investigated,” a transport department official said.

“The investigation will be followed by police action, if needed, and the entry of touts identified in the pictures will banned inside RTOs,” he said.

The Burari transport authority, which has been in the eye of the storm, is also witnessing many new measures being taken to keep touts out. “We have made it mandatory for anyone entering the authority to show identification and vehicle or other work related document to establish that they are genuine applicants and not touts. We have also stopped the entry of auto rickshaw union members, except at designated meeting time,” he said. “Three personnel of our enforcement wing are permanently deployed near the entry gate, along with an enforcement vehicle, to stop any unauthorised entry,” the official said.