Transport minister Chandan Brahma (left) hands over a smart card to a customer at the Kamrup district transport office in Guwahati on Tuesday. Picture by Eastern Projections

Smart cards for Assam vehicles

Guwahati, Feb. 3: Assam today became the first state in the Northeast to issue smart card-based driving licence and registration certificates to commercial vehicles.

Transport minister Chandan Brahma inaugurated the “fully-computerised system” at the Kamrup district transport (registration and licensing) office at Betkuchi here this morning.

Brahma announced that from today the Kamrup DTO would issue only these licences and certificates and the new system could be introduced in the remaining districts of the state in a year.

The cards, with an embedded microchip, will have a visual part and a “computer-readable zone”. It will have the licence holder’s photograph, signature and biometrics in electronic form.

“This card can also be used by the licence holder as his or her identity proof as it is acceptable not only in our country but throughout the world,” Brahma said.

The system will conform to national security requirements. From the security angle it is a major advantage as the data can be updated, but not erased.

According to the transport officials, the data stored in the optical strip is digitally signed, making unauthorised access impossible.

Principal secretary of the state transport department Alok Kumar said the transport computerisation project in Assam was being implemented since early 2005 by the National Informatics Centre (NIC) in association with the transport department and Assam Electronics Development Corporation Ltd (Amtron) in a phased manner.

Kumar said computerisation of the DTOs was being done by the NIC through the use of two all-comprehensive standard software applications, Vahan and Sarathi.

Vahan handles computerisation of the registration, tax collection, issuance of permits and enforcement aspects of the vehicles while Sarathi deals with computerisation of the process for issuing driving licenses.

The Kamrup DTO started issuing such cards to private vehicles on February 3, 2008 on an “experimental basis.

“From today, the Kamrup DTO started issuing smart card-based documents to all kinds of vehicles,” Kumar said.

Transport minister Chandan Brahma said work for transport computerisation projects was on in Nagaon, Morigaon, Sonitpur, Lakhimpur, Tinsukia, Dhemaji, Goalpara, Nalbari, Dibrugarh and Darrang districts.

“The project includes a wide range of people-friendly services that will enable the applicants to apply for issuance and registration of certificates as well as pay vehicle taxes through the Internet,” he said.