KOCHI: Suspension of driving licence has turned out to be an effective enforcement tool for the Motor Vehicle Department (MVD). The licences of over 150 errant motorists have already been suspended in Ernakulam district, while similar fate awaits over 175 motorists.
The Supreme Court Road Safety Committee had recommended driving licence suspension for three months for traffic offences including overloading, use of mobile phone while driving, signal jumping, over-speeding, and transporting passengers on goods vehicles.
“The number of accidents and the rate of traffic offences have come down since we began suspending licences. It has been an effective deterrent against overloading, which is being resorted to by drivers with impunity,” said Ernakulam Regional Transport Officer Reji Varghese.
Since the launch of Operation Suraksha almost a month ago on the apex court committee’s direction, 151 driving licences have been suspended within the limits of the Ernakulam and Muvattupuzha regional transport offices and their seven sub-RTOs. This is in addition to 176 notices either served or about to be served to motorists for mandatory hearing before licence suspension. This includes 70 motorists netted during the 24-hour drive held earlier this week.
As many as 35 licences have been suspended within the Muvattupuzha RTO limits and 26 in the Ernakulam RTO limits.
Twenty-five licences have been suspended in the Angamaly sub RTO limits, while 19 licences remain suspended in Thripunithura and 16 in Kothamangalam. In Perumbavoor, as many as 15 licences have been suspended, while seven licences have been suspended in Paravur and four each in Aluva and Mattancherry sub RTO limits.
Empowering officials
Thripunithura Joint Regional Transport Officer K. Manojkumar said empowering MVD officials has proved to be the much-needed morale booster for them. “Check reports were getting stacked up in our office, with offenders not paying fine. As suspension of licence will affect their livelihood, drivers will be averse to overloading,” he added.
Meanwhile, MVD officials have noticed a perceptible drop in offences like use of mobile phone while driving and rash driving by tipper lorry drivers. Transportation of workers on goods vehicles is also being strictly dealt with, and officials took a mini lorry into custody recently during an overnight drive.
In some cases, officials use their discretionary powers. For instance, an official said he had strictly enforced the three-month suspension of licence in the case of teenage offenders, while others whose livelihood would be affected were being dealt more leniently, and their licences were suspended just for a month.
