Address shortage of personnel at RTO, says MLA

Mangaluru: Noting that an acute shortage of staff at the Mangaluru regional transport office (RTO) is causing great hardship to people, Mangaluru City South MLA D Vedavyas Kamath urged district minister U T Khader and the state government to intervene and resolve the issue. The MLA warned that a protest will be held outside the RTO if the government did not intervene forthwith, as a shortage in the second-most revenue generating RTO in the state is incomprehensible.
The office does not have a full-fledged officer serving in it. As against 20 traffic inspectors in 1998, the office is now functioning with only 3-4 inspectors serving there. The number of superintendents is now half the earlier strength of four. The assistant RTOs at the office is now one, against three such officers earlier. There is no one posted as headquarter’s assistant to the regional transport officer, the MLA said.
The other staff at the office have now whittled down to 10 as against 35 earlier. All this has left the people who approach the office for their needs facing uncertain times, he said, adding with the government now insisting on delivery of vehicles with high security number plates, all this staff shortage will only add to the delay in vehicle owners receiving their registration certificate (RC) on time, which in some cases has been delayed by a month or two, he said.
The RTO is also not able to dispatch the RC through registered post in time due to the staff shortage. “The issue of an unresponsive server is the other common excuse that one hears at the office,” he said, adding this forces people to wait for hours there for their services. Other critical services such as renewal of driving licence is handled using old computers with one employee, which further adds to the already slow-functioning of this important office,” he said.
“With physical fitness certificate of a government doctor now mandatory for renewal of driving licence, people are also forced to go in search of these hand-picked doctors,” he said. “The facilities for those who go to the driving track for a driving test too is pitiable,” he said. “With inspectors coming there at their own time, people who go there for the test too are hard-pressed,” he said, adding the in-charge RTO must take note of these issues and set them right at the earliest.