Bhubaneswar, Aug. 7: The regional transport office (RTO), Bhubaneswar, has penalised the owners of 41 vehicles for not adhering to norms stipulated by Supreme Court for transporting schoolchildren in the city.

The RTO has been carrying out the drive since July 18 following a fire mishap in an LPG-driven vehicle transporting school kids in Cuttack. Although no one was hurt, the incident had made evident the fact that owners of vehicles engaged for transportation of children had scant regard for safety norms.

During the drive, the officials have come across cases of vehicles without proper registration documents. For instance, a vehicle registered under contract carriage is not supposed to ferry schoolchildren. The raid also revealed that private vehicles were being used for the purpose and most of the vehicles were operating without valid fitness certificates.

A fitness certificate is supposed to be renewed every year to ensure that the vehicles were fit to ply on the roads.

Officials said two vehicles had been seized and the remaining 39 were made to pay fines ranging between Rs 2,000 and Rs 5,000 depending on the nature of the offence. “The drive will continue and all school buses will be checked,” said a senior official at the RTO, Bhubaneswar. School authorities are registering their respective school buses.

Transport authorities have also written letters to the principals and headmasters of various educational institutions in the city to ensure that all school buses plying in the city adhered to the norms.

“We have approached 150 schools to ensure the safety of children. We will give some time to the school authorities to comply with the norms and after that, stringent action will be taken against the violators,” said regional transport officer, Bhubaneswar, Lal Mohan Sethy.

According to Supreme Court guidelines, school buses need to have an emergency door, the symbol of the institute, first-aid box, window grills and fire extinguishers. Most of these vehicles were found without emergency doors. Some of them do not have fire extinguishers and first-aid kits.

Parents felt that the authorities must expedite the raids on unauthorised motor vehicles ferrying schoolchildren. “Hundreds of vehicles are being used to ferry schoolchildren. But the RTO has been able to crack down only on a small number of vehicles. We are not aware of all the norms and so we cannot be sure if they are abiding by all the rules. So, the authorities must expedite their drive,” said Suresh Mohapatra, a parent.

An official in the RTO said that so far, more than 855 school buses had been registered with the RTO, Bhubaneswar.