New Delhi, Feb 12 (PTI) Delhi government has relaxed the height and experience criteria for recruitment of women drivers for DTC and cluster buses in the city.
The minimum height has been reduced from 159 cm to 153 cm while the experience period after issuance of Heavy Motor Vehicle (HMV) license has been lowered to one month from three years in the past for female applicants applying for the post of bus driver, said a Transport Department statement.
A proposal has been made to specially allocate funds in the form of subsidies for women drivers to train at Delhi government’s Burari Driving Training Institute in the upcoming budget 2022-23, it said.
“We have not only relaxed the eligibility criteria, but we will also ensure that women are provided free training in our Burari driving training institute. We have proposed the same in our upcoming budget,” Transport Minister Kailash Gahlot said.
The step will give more opportunities to women for get a job as a driver for the combined fleet strength of 6,900 buses in the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) and Delhi Integrated Multi-modal Transit System (DIMTS) employing 15,000 drivers, the statement said.
The government will provide hands-on road training to women drivers during the one-month period on its non-occupied buses. After completion of the mandatory one-month training, women will have to go through a round of testing to be inducted as bus drivers, it said.
The height criteria had remained a long-standing hurdle for young women who wanted to be employed as bus drivers within the state transport services.
The transport minister had constituted a special committee of experts to deliberate on the issue and suggest the optimal criteria which could work in the favour of women.
“It was felt that there was a need to further reduce the minimum height criteria in line with global standards and bring it down to 153 cm to enable more women to apply as bus drivers,” the statement said.
Azad Foundation, a non-profit group which has been promoting women employment by training them to become professional drivers suggested that there is demand and willingness in women to become bus drivers.
The decision to relax the norms may result into at least 15-20 women being inducted to bus driving operations every year, it claimed. PTI VIT RHL
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