Handful of vehicles rejected fitness certificate

Fitness certificates are compulsory for commercial vehicles like rickshaws, taxis and trucks. When these certificates are given out, parameters like brake testing, inspection of tail lamps, horn, engine and tail lights must be done.

“However, doing this requires a lot of time, which is not possible for manpower starved RTOs. After all, how many vehicles can two inspectors look at in eight hours?” noted a senior official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The official added that many a time, RTO staff took recourse to practices like taking money from applicants through agents, and then issuing certificates without inspecting them properly, with an odd applicant facing rejection 'only if something went wrong'.

More often than not, these fitness certificates are issued without even taking the vehicle to the RTO, the official also said, adding that former transport commissioner Mahesh Zagade, who had cracked down on malpractices in the department and was shunted out to the PMRDA, had tried to rein this in.

“To reduce accidents and the resultant death toll, it is necessary to have good drivers and vehicles,” the official said, noting that a moth eaten system bypassed the criterion necessary for the same.