The second public vehicles department office in the city opened in the CSTC depot near the Ruby rotary on the EM Bypass on Friday.

The Kasba office will offer all the services available at the PVD office in Beltala. The new office has security cameras near the counters that, according to officials, will keep out touts and ensure hassle-free transactions.

“We plan to set up two more PVD offices in north Calcutta and Salt Lake,” transport minister Subrata Bakshi said at the inauguration.

“We have also decided to send driving licenses by registered post from January 2012. No one will have to turn up at the PVD offices to collect them,” said transport secretary B.P. Gopalika.

Theft: A conman pretending to be a plainclothesman stole a gold chain worth Rs 15,000 from a 70-year-old woman in Kalindi on Friday afternoon. The man asked Monika Singh to take her chain off as the area was not safe and offered to wrap the ornament in a piece of paper. She did not find the chain after she reached home and lodged a complaint. A woman was robbed of jewellery worth Rs 1 lakh near Park Circus in the same manner on Thursday.

Metro crack: Metro Railway services were stalled for more than an hour on Friday afternoon after a crack was spotted on a Kavi Subhas-bound track between Kalighat and Rabindra Sarobar stations at 3.21pm. Services resumed after the crack was repaired at 4.30pm. Contraction of tracks because of change in weather has led to the crack, said a Metro official.

Fire: A fire broke out in a building near Infinity building in Salt Lake’s Sector V on Friday afternoon. Sparks from a welding work going on at a factory near the building led to the blaze, said a fire department official. Four tenders doused the flames.