VIJAYAWADA: The State Police relaunched the e-challan application to prevent any irregularities in the system across the State.
This move came after the traffic police e-challan scam came to light six months ago, where a revenue loss of at least Rs 30 crore per month was reported.
The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) developed the new application to replace the older version. Currently, the latest mobile application is under the initial stage of operations. It will come fully operational in all the police stations across the State by the end of April. No middlemen nor any private company will be involved in the maintenance of the application, as the MORTH and National Informatics Centre (NIC) are technology partners.
The decision to go for a revised e-challan application came after the State police unearthed a major scandal, involving transactions through e-challans to the tune of Rs 36.55 crore by the son-in-law of a retired director general of police (DGP) and two others.
Subsequently, the State government approached MoRTH to develop a similar Android-based mobile application for police under the pan-India project, which is being developed by NIC. “The new application enables a comprehensive digital solution for enforcement of traffic rules and transparency in the collection of fines from violators,” said a senior official on the condition of anonymity.
Sources in the police department sais the new window for e-challan provided several user-friendly features, covering all major functionalities of the traffic enforcement system such as issuance of traffic e-challan, on-the-spot cashless payment, real-time excess of Vahan and Sarathi database, access to previous records and integration with DigiLocker and m-Parivahan apps using a hand-held device.
It might be recalled that retired DGP N Sambasiva Rao’s son-in-law Kommireddy Avinash’s company, Data Evolve, had secured a contract for e-challan service provider, software and mobile app services for police to impose challans and collect money from the violators in 2018 through an open tender quoting just Rs 1 as user charge for every transaction made. In five years, the accused allegedly amassed Rs 36.65 crore among the Rs 100 crore collected through fines. With the arrest of Avinash and two other accused, the entire traffic challans and its administrative operations in all the districts across the State came to a grinding halt for the past six months.
“Training and induction on the mobile app has been in process for all traffic, law and order police across the State, while some officials have started using it,” a senior official from the technical department said.