The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) is planning to introduce in Uttar Pradesh an advanced pollution control system to control the rising pollution levels caused by a large number of polluting vehicles. The system is already functional in Delhi, and if the Uttar Pradesh experiment succeeds, it will gradually be expanded throughout the country. The multi-functional system will check the fitness of vehicles, and reduce air and noise pollution, in addition to minimising road accidents. Currently, a motor vehicle inspector manually checks vehicles and issues a fitness certificate for roadworthy vehicles.
The new system will replace manual checking with an automated system which will check the various components of a vehicle such as the engine, brakes and the vehicle’s fuel emission. The Ministry’s aim is to develop a four-lane facility capable of inspecting up to 50 buses every day. The automated system needs quite a bit of space to function, and one proposal was to set it up on an 80,000 square foot plot near the Lucknow RTO. While in a preliminary survey the Uttar Pradesh Transport Department has found the site to be fit for installing the system, the central ministry has to approve the proposal.