Sada-e-Watan Sydney ™
sadaewatan@gmail.com

Quick response & action from Deputy High Commissioner of Pakistan

23rd Feb 2007,

Syed Zafar Hussain
Editor-in-Chief
Sada-e-Watan Sydney

Ref: PAKISTANI DRIVING LICENCE

Dear Mr. Zafar,

Thank you for your email regarding the subject matter. The High Commission is in knowledge of the issue and is handling it accordingly. In this regard the High Commission would like to bring the following points for the information of your newspaper Sada-e-Watan and the Pakistani Community in Australia:-

a) As known that presently in Pakistan issuance of Driving Licenses is a Provincial Subject and each Province has its own type of License i.e computerized, booklet, paper sheet form, typed cards with laminations etc.

b) Therefore it would not be possible for all the RTA's of all the states in Australia to have each and every pattern of Pakistani Driving Licenses in their manuals. The High Commission is however trying to provide the copies of same to concerned authorities in Australia.

c) As the general requirement of RTA is that whenever any Pakistani National applies for Australian Driving License on the basis of his/her Pakistani Driving License they want that to be attested by the Pakistan High Commission. Since we do not have record of the same therefore in order solve the problem the practice in vogue is that the applicant is requested to have his License verified by the issuing authority in Pakistan and also attested by Consular Section of Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Islamabad and its camp offices in Peshawar, Lahore, Quetta and Karachi and thereafter sent to us for attestation. This information is also placed on our website.

2) I hope the above information will clarify the subject matter.

Yours sincerely,

(Tanveer A. Khaskheli)
Deputy High Commissioner
High Commission for Pakistan
4 Timbarra Crescent, O' Malley,
ACT 2606 Canberra (Australia)
Tel: 02-62901676 - Fax:02-69201073