If everything goes as per the plans of the state, the city may soon get its fourth Regional Transport Office (RTO) in the northern suburbs by the end of this year, confirmed a senior RTO official.
The move will come as a huge relief to the increasing number of new motorists, especially taxi and autorickshaw unions in the northern suburbs who currently approach the Andheri RTO.
Also, nearly 50 per cent of the posts at the Andheri RTO are vacant making it a Herculean task for the existing manpower.
A senior transport official said, “With the numbers of vehicles increasing at a steady rate, one more RTO is the need of the hour. It would definitely ease the burden of the Andheri RTO that is facing an acute staff crunch and has a huge backlog of applications for licences, renewals and registration coming in from northern suburbs (Goregaon to Dahisar).”
The project was stuck due to unavailability of land for the past two years, but in a recent development, the RTO officials will be selecting a place to start the RTO office either in Borivali, Kandivali or in Malad’s Malwani.
Currently, Mumbai has just three RTOs at Tardeo, Wadala and Andheri, which collectively receive over 1,500 driving licence applications and over 1,200 registration applications of vehicles per day. The RTO is also entrusted with the work of enforcement of the Motor Vehicle Act, including cancellation of licences. Last year, the state got its 50th RTO in CM Prithviraj Chavan’s hometown Karad, but the plan to start the 47th RTO in the northern suburbs never materialised due to unavailability of land.
Since their inception till March 2013, all the operational RTOs in Maharashtra have registered about 2,14,35,530 vehicles.