MoLTM Proposes Additional Service Centers

Good news to vehicle owners who are facing different hassles while getting services related to vehicle documentation. If the proposal of Ministry of Labor and Transport Management (MoLTM) materializes, services seekers in the Kathmandu valley will soon find their problems lessened with the establishment of new service centers to deal with transport related services.

Keeping in view the ever increasing problems for vehicle owners at Bagmati Zonal Transport Management Office (BZTMO) -- probably the most crowed government office -- due to rising number of service seekers, the MoLTM took the initiative to expand its service outside the Ring Road. With the new arrangements, the government aims to lessen the crowd of vehicles inside ring road and crowd of service seekers at BZTMO.

The MoLTM Wednesday forwarded a proposal prepared by the Department of Transport Management (DoTM) to the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of General Administration and Office of Financial Comptroller General to arrange necessary budget and employees for the purpose.

Sarad Chandra Paudel, director general of DoTM, told that proposed service centers will be opened in Balaju area of Kathmandu and Sallaghari area of Bhaktapur so as to limit inflow of vehicles inside the Ring Road area and ease burden on existing service centers at Ekantakuna and Satdobato in Lalitpur.

“We have proposed 10 employees for each service center and have requested the government to allocate Rs 4 million to run the centers that will also have internet facilities. We will immediately open the centers once we get necessary budget and employees,” Paudel said. Necessary employees will be arranged from the MoLTM, reserve pool and other offices where comfortable numbers of employees are deployed, he added

People will get services such as tax collection, bill-book renewal, route permit renewal, checking of vehicles condition, checking of vehicle´s pollution level and registration of application for driving license. However, registration and transfer of ownership of vehicles will be carried out through the existing transport offices.

Responding to growing complaints from customers about the ineffective service delivery from BZTMO, the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA), couple of months back, had directed to the MoLTM to improve its service delivery.

“We expect the number of service seekers at existing service centers to go down by almost one-third after the new service centers start operation,” Paudel said.

The BZTMO issues over one thousands driving licenses a day. Likewise, it registers about 1,500 new vehicles and renews registration of 800 vehicles in a day.