The online databases for driving licence and registration certificates (RC) have taken off in the city, even though officials at the Regional Transport Office (RTO) admitted that there had been some difficulties in collecting and uploading the data.

The National Informatics Centre developed two applications – ‘Vahan’ for vehicle registration and ‘Sarathi’ for driving licences – for the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.

The applications intend to compile data pertaining to vehicle registration and driving licences of all the States in State Register and National Register, according to the website of ‘Parivahan Sewa’, where both ‘Sarathi’ and ‘Vahan’ are available.

“Any initiative will face glitches in the beginning,” a senior RTO official told The Hindu when asked about the process of data collection. Nevertheless, the official termed the process of collecting the data from individual servers and uploading to the centralised server as an “achievement.”

The centralised server can help police identify whether the driving licences and RCs were genuine, according to K. Kathirmathiyon, Secretary, Coimbatore Consumer Cause (CCC). “There were no records on suspended [driving] licences earlier,” he said, adding that it is now possible to check the details of an individual’s driving licence and registration certificate.

According to the data available at Pariwahan Sewa, Tamil Nadu has the highest number of sites with Centralised Vahan4 (fourth version of the application) with 136 sites across the State.

On the question of linking Aadhaar with the licences issued under Sarathi, RTO officials said that it was meant only for proof of address. Mr. Kathirmathiyon said that there are no possible privacy issues, adding that “honest and law-abiding” citizens do not have to hesitate regarding linking of Aadhaar.