The Transport Department is all braced up to scrap the implementation and maintenance of the “Mo Yatra Suraksha AIS-140 VLTD State-backend project and hand over the operations to a firm with a highly dubious track record.
Reports said the State exchequer would incur a huge financial loss as the State Transport Authority (STA) has spent Rs. 9.45 crores in design, development, customization, implementation and maintenance of the aforesaid Mo Yatra Suraksha AIS-140 VLTD State backend software system of Odisha which agencies like C-DAC have proposed to replace the backend.
Scrapping the Mo Yatra Suraksha operations would result in huge loss to the exchequer, untended audits and litigations.
Besides, it is a conflict of interest as Clauses 2.2.3 and 2.15 of Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) notification dated 29.06.2021 imposes restriction on State to appoint such agency who itself or any of its subcontractors is directly or indirectly a VLTD manufacturers or E-Sim M2M service provider.
However, appointment of agencies like C-DAC would benefit the VLTD manufacturers and E-Sim M2M Service providers operating behind curtains who have vested interest in the project.
It might be mentioned here that due to poor performance and malpractices, other States like West Bengal and Telangana have issued show cause notices to C-DAC and have proceeded to cancel their services following their poor performance and malpractices in the implementation of the VLTD project in those States.
Further in States like Karnataka, C-DAC has been reported to follow restrictive practices and promote cartelisation, where VLTD manufacturers are forced to use restricted M2M E-Sim promoted by the agency.
Currently, the Mo Yatra Suraksha system is in use by the Odisha public, government officers, departments, permit owners, manufacturers and other stakeholders. The application is in use by more than two lakh users in public and government users State-wide.
Earlier extensive and expensive training exercises were carried which involved coordination, mobilisation and multi day training of RTOs, MVIs, police personnel, traffic and enforcements teams, ERSS teams and other government departments and officials, incurring huge cost to the government, said Road Safety expert Subrat Kumar Nanda.
The transition would cause huge loss and inconvenience to the public and re-training and re-skilling:would be highly expensive and transition would also come at a huge loss of time and resources for the government for re-conduction of training sessions and public awareness. Government officials need to be trained on the new system, which takes time and resources. This would lead to temporary inefficiencies, said Nanda.
Besides, it would lead to disruption and concerns in public safety as more than 40,000 vehicles are connected to the current Mo Yatra Suraksha system. It is reported that the manufacturers need at least six months to transition to new system, thereby jeopardising public safety and security.
Also changing the system would raise questions and showcase inefficiency of the government to the general public.
The Clause 2.2.1 and 3.4.2 of MoRTH notification dated 29.06.2021 mandated that the implementation agency of AIS140 VLTD project should be a company incorporated in India under the Companies Act, 1956/2013. However, C-DAC is registered as ‘Society’ and has been falsely representing that it is a company. C-DAC has also been falsely representing that it does not involve any third party partner in the implementation of the project, while it has been reported that in the States of Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, West Bengal and Karnataka. Its partners are operating the backend and command centers on behalf of C-DAC. On the other hand, another agency – DIMTS has also submitted a proposal. DIMTS is a “Project Management Unit” (PMU) of the AIS-140 project at MoRTH level and is responsible for coordinating between the stakeholders and hence, cannot be appointed as executing agency of the same project.
Though BSNL has been asked to provide support and maintenance of the project for one month or till STA finalises the new agency, but reportedly BSNL is unable to establish a firm team to execute the project. The public procurement policy of Odisha mandates open e-Tender process with preference to local micro and small enterprises. However, such a mandatory process has been by-passed by the STA, said Nanda.
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