The smart card, with a memory of 4KB, has replaced the driver’s licence and apart from carrying the usual information such as name, photograph, signature and thumb impression of the cardholder, it also has a unique gradation system based on traffic offences, if any. So, the device becomes important to either read the history of offences committed by a driver or to feed information into it about any fresh traffic violations.

“So far we do not have the readers. It (buying readers) is on our agenda and we hope to procure them in two to three months,” said Vijay Kamble, joint commissioner of police (Traffic). And it becomes all the more important for the police to acquire such card readers at the earliest in the wake of its intensified crackdown on drunk driving in the city—since June 20, the traffic police have registered 4,328 cases of drunk driving and have got 461 licences suspended.

Kamble admitted that the card readers could have been useful against drunk drivers having smart card licences. Though the traffic department doesn’t maintain a break-up of number of smart card licence holders nabbed during its drive against drunk driving, officials admit that a significant number of offenders had such licences.