Patna, Nov. 23: While innocent lives are being lost under the wheels of school buses, the buck on reining in the rogue drivers passes on. Schools claim they are doing their bit. So do police. The district transport officer (DTO) today passed on the responsibility to the institutions.

Prodded on action taken against reckless school bus drivers, the officer could only recall an incident two years ago.

Harihar Prasad, the Patna DTO, said the schools are responsible for their drivers. The transport office does not issue licence on the basis of the profession of a person, he reasoned.

“We do not have a separate system for issuing licences to the drivers of school buses. The licence is issued to a person, not to a profession. It is for the schools to check the driver’s credibility when they select him for the job,” said Prasad.

The DTO, however, said if the school administrations approach the district transport office to check the fitness of the vehicles and credibility of the school bus drivers, the motor vehicle inspectors could do the same.

“It is the primary duty of the school administration to check the credibility of their bus drivers. So it is their responsibility to approach us for checking the identity and credibility of the drivers. Once we are approached with such requests, we will immediately send the motor vehicle inspectors on the job,” said Prasad.

On the motor vehicle inspectors’ role in keeping tabs on reckless drivers, Prasad said: “We have two motor vehicle inspectors in the district. They are mostly involved in checking the fitness of the vehicles and issuing challans in case of any violation under the Motor Vehicle Act, 1982, on the field.

“While the motor vehicle inspectors can penalise offenders, cancellation of driving licences is rare. According to the seriousness of an offence, a driver can be issued a challan or a showcause notice. Only in extreme cases, a driver’s licence is cancelled. But, according to a provision in the act, the driver can appeal against the cancellation order in the district court or high court,” added Prasad.

As The Telegraph asked Prasad to furnish the number of cases in the past few months when licences of reckless bus drivers were cancelled, he cited the non-availability of such data with him because such cancellations were rare.

He, however, could give one instance. “While there are a few cases when driving licences have been cancelled, it is difficult to say how many of them were of reckless bus drivers. But I would like to mention one incident that occurred two years ago. We had cancelled the licence of the bus driver of Delhi Public School after an accident because of the driver’s carelessness,” said Prasad.