Lower rung staff in RTA double up as officials

Hyderabad: There is a severe shortage of senior officials in Road Transport Authority (RTA) and as a result, the lower level officials like superintendents, administrative officers and motor vehicle inspectors are performing the duties of RTO against the MVI rules.

According to sources, in the recent times a handful of senior officials in RTA retired and some more would be retiring by the end of this year. The new districts have added to the woes as the junior officials are handling the work of DTOs without any written orders.

Sources in the department said that there was no fulltime commissioner as Transport Secretary Sunil Sharma has been given the additional charge. Sunil Sharma takes up review meetings in the Secretariat and the responsibility of Commissionerate has been given to T Raghunath, who is looking after administration as Joint Transport Commissioner.

There is no post of Additional Commissioner in the department at present. The Additional Commissioner post had gone to Andhra Pradesh post bifurcation after the retirement of incumbent C L N Gandhi. Recently, Joint Transport Commissioner (Vigilance) B Venkateshwarlu retired from the services. Sources said that JTC Raghunath would also be going to retire this month. Last month, RTO GPN Prasad, who used to look after transport and non-transport sections also retired.

Before the division, the department had posts of one Additional Commissioner and four JTCs. One additional and two JTCs had gone to Andhra Pradesh and two JTCs for Telangana. The districts have increased but no post was sanctioned as per the requirement.

Sources said that the new districts had also led to chaos as there were not sufficient officials to take up routine work and subordinates were handling the job of senior officials. Some of the officials were made in-charges of five districts, the sources added.

Experts say that lower level officers cannot issue permit certificates and other important documents. An RTO/DTO has the powers to cancel the permit but in the absence of the higher official, the AOs and MVIs are signing the certificates. Sources said the government had not given any official orders but still the lower level officials are handling the works only on oral instructions.

Sources said that the Secunderabad RTO was given the responsibility of Sangareddy, which should be handled by Deputy Transport Commissioner as he had to oversee works of Medak, Siddipet and Zaheerabad districts. In the districts like Ranga Reddy and Nalgonda, the works were handled by superintendents, added the sources.

Transport expert and former Additional Commissioner C L N Gandhi, talking to The Hans India, said there was complete chaos in the department. There was no regular commissioner, no policy decision maker and administration was run routinely, he said.