The government has missed its target to start issuing new hi-tech driving licences from this month. After the contractor sought more time to ready the whole system, the Department of Transport Management (DoTM) has extended the project completion deadline by three months.
Indian firm Madras Security Printers has been carrying out the project funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) under a component of ICT Development Project in Nepal. “Though the system is almost ready, we are not in a position to start printing the e-driving licence,” said Tulasi Prasad Sitaula, secretary at the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport.
Based on the contractor’s request, DoTM — the project implementing authority — recently extended the project deadline to March 31. Going by the agreement, the company was supposed to make the system ready, impart necessary training to Nepali government officials to run the system, and start issuance of the driving licence by this month.
The new driving licence will contain information, including photo, name, address, phone number, fingerprint, blood group, occupation, and issuance and expiry date of the driving licence.
It is expected to help prevent forgery, falsification and illegal issuance of driving licences and bill book and aid in maintaining all information electronically in a scientific manner. The project is also a part of the government’s e-governance initiative. ADB has provided $2.3 million to the government for this project.
As a part of the contract, besides making the system ready, Madras Security Printers is also responsible for delivering 160,000 units of e-driving licences.
Sarad Bhattarai, technical director of DoTM, said the project had faced setbacks as it entailed multiple components. Mainly, the contractor is yet to install software to make the new driving licence issuance possible.
The Indian firm will have to procure, deploy and commission the system to issue e-driving licence and vehicle ownership certificate (commonly known as bill book) by installing the required IT and smartcard infrastructure at the Government Integrated Data Centre (GIDC).
In October last year, the Indian firm and DoTM had signed an agreement to replace the existing paper card based licence and bill book with ‘high security smartcard based credentials’.
In the first phase, hi-tech licence has been planned for distribution through Bagmati Zone Transport Management Office. Both e-driving licences and e-bill books are expected to come into full implementation within 2015 across the country. Government has issued over two million driving licences till date and reportedly around 300,000 new driving licences are issued every year.
MoPIT mulls outsourcing embossed number plate project
KATHMANDU: The government is mulling over assigning a project to implement the embossed number plate system in vehicles to an individual company rather than going for competitive bidding. A high level official at the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport said that some companies have approached the ministry stating that they are interested to invest in embossed number plate project and make the embossed plates available to customers at similar rates as hand painted ones.
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Quelle/Source: The Himalayan Times, 25.12.2014
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