Drivers with fake licences

That more than one million drivers of motorised vehicles are without valid licences reflect a sordid state of affairs with the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA) as well as the traffic police department.  What is more distressing and dangerous is the inaction of the authorities concerned in dealing with such a long-lingering problem. A FE report published last Tuesday shows how careless the authorities are in nabbing the delinquent drivers. The report said more than one million of them are now driving cars and buses without having genuine licences. Against this backdrop, it is not difficult to understand why accidents are so frequent in the country and why the death toll because of such accidents is mounting. But it is not understandable why the higher authorities are allowing the BRTA and the traffic police to be only silent spectators.
Most of the drivers of public transports and goods-carrying transports do not have any academic or formal training for driving. Many of them do not have any formal letter of employment or written agreements with their employers. The latter group of drivers are otherwise in a state of job insecurity, which affects, at times, their mental stability. A driver's responsibility depends on his mental and physical fitness. Such abilities are necessary to avoid road accidents. Apart from unskilled drivers, inadequacy of driving schools and lack of awareness among the pedestrians are also reasons behind a rising number of road accidents. Proper enforcement of traffic laws could reduce the number of such accidents to a considerable extent.
  What is really intriguing is that the BRTA itself is keeping up-to-date data on the number of people with fake licences but it appears to be quite impotent in doing anything about it. According to the BRTA, a total of nearly 2.3 million vehicles were registered with it in 2013. At the same time, the authority issued only 1.43 million licences to the motorists.
The communications minister himself is at his wit's end on the issue of corruption inside the BRTA. Once he wondered how the country's five vehicle inspection centres remain inoperative for decades. They deliberately keep the machines inoperative to inflate their pockets. The minister was reported to have further said the fitness certificates are being given manually to serve rent-seeking purposes. Some 4,000 people die in road accidents while property worth around Tk 50 billion is damaged annually in Bangladesh, according to a rough reckoning. There is, in fact, no shortcut to proper training for obtaining genuine licences to stop such deaths and damages. It is time to introduce motor driving training courses at the technical schools and institutions under the ministries concerned.
Statistics say 70,000 drivers have so far gone abroad with jobs. But many of them are facing difficulties in the overseas since they had fake licences. It is now time for the authorities concerned to identify all fake driving licence-holders and bring them into the mainstream through proper training. All conscious citizens, too, have a role to play in ensuring road safety. While travelling in public transports, passengers should protest and stop speeding and reckless driving by bus and taxi drivers. Owners of motor vehicles should ensure that the drivers who are employed by them, have genuine licences, are properly trained and drive responsibly. Road safety education to pedestrians, especially children, within the communities by the community leaders is also a good way to promote a healthier road environment.