CHENNAI: In what should come across as a significant finding, an RTI response has revealed that the average pass percentage for driving tests, conducted in four RTOs in Chennai, stands at over 90%. This means only one in 10 fails the test, a figure which has left road transport experts disputing over what this high pass percentage really means.
Curious over the number of successful aspirants, Ramiah Ariya, Coordinator, Roads, at Arapor Iyyakam (an NGO) filed an RTI petition seeking data from RTOs in the city last year. Four of them replied with the numbers recently. For the period from December 2015 to September 2016, the average failure percentage for Motorcycles with Gear (MCWG) and Light Motor Vehicles at Thiruvanmiyur RTO was 3.06 and 4.35, respectively. Similar low fail percentage was witnessed at Tondiarpet RTO, where the average failure percentage for Motorcycles with Gear (MCWG) and Light Motor Vehicles (LMV) was 2.73 and 4.82 respectively for January-August last year.
There are several who question the high pass percentage, including M Radhakrishnan, organiser of Thozhan, a road safety NGO, who said he remains skeptical of the testing process. “There are very few people who get license with knowledge about road safety,” he stated.
That being the case, he wondered whether tests are becoming a mere formality. Claiming the route to obtaining a license is via a mediating agency or institute, Radhakrishnan claimed, “It is known that some people obtain licenses without even appearing for the tests.
Sharing Radhakrishnan’s opinion, N S Srinivasan of the Traffic Advisory Forum said individuals need to be comprehensively screened before they are given the license. “In certain countries, there is a three-tier test namely, theory, medical or aptitude followed by the
actual driving. What we do here is not a thorough process. The important aspect of evaluating a driver’s psychology or behaviour is not considered,” he said.
When contacted, a Regional Transport Officer, on condition of anonymity, said the average driving test for a car takes less than 10 minutes, while the time taken for a two-wheeler to complete the requisite ‘8’ is even less. The total time allotted each day is just three hours, before which inspection must be completed. The officer said, “There exists possibilities when the inspector may choose to overlook a small slip by the drivers.”