Reinventing the Wheel
SANJAYAGARWAL, 43 Secretary, Bihar transport department, PATNA
The increase in the penalty for violating the Pollution Under Control (PUC) certificate norms to Rs 10,000 posed a huge problem for Bihar motorists. While more than 175,000 vehicles are registered every year in Patna alone, there are a mere 100 pollution test centres in the city.
Sanjay Agarwal, secretary to the state’s transport department and a 2002 batch IAS officer, was quick to identify this gap. Besides opening new centres, he also launched a ‘Mobile Pollution Check Vehicle’ just a fortnight after the new Motor Vehicles Act came into effect. Patna now has 10 such vehicles available on call.
“People can now call these vehicles to their housing societies and get the PUC certificate issued on the spot within minutes. We plan to introduce similar vehicles in all districts of Bihar. The initiative is helping rural consumers even more because we have few pollution test centres in villages,” says Agarwal. To top it all, the facility is available at no extra cost. The department has a revenue sharing model scripted with the service provider.
Agarwal has now become the go-to man for the state government. From turning Jehanabad, a hotbed of extremism, into a mascot of development during his stint as district magistrate (DM), to transforming Nalanda, a water-deficit district into an agro-friendly area during his tenure as DM there, Agarwal has gone beyond what is expected of bureaucrats. In Nalanda, instead of trying to develop an alternative irrigation system, he linked NREGA with cleaning and revival of the existing irrigation canals with active support from the locals. In 2012, he was selected for the Prime Minister’s award for excellent implementation of a rural development schemes in Nalanda.
Sanjay has excelled as transport secretary too, having ramped up government revenue by over 30 per cent in the last financial year alone. He is also credited with launching a city bus service for Patna in May last year. Within six months of their launch, these buses together ferry over 50,000 passengers everyday in Patna. He also started several new transport department schemes, including e-registration, an online application system for driving licence, dealer point registration and online payment of road taxes, besides other measures, which have brought transparency in services. ■
“THE INITIATIVE IS HELPING RURAL CONSUMERS MORE SINCE WE HAVE FEW POLLUTION TEST CENTRES IN VILLAGES”