CHICAGO (AP) - The New Delhi Driving School has traveled a rocky road.
At least one of its students showed up for his state license test without knowing how to start his car. Others didn't seem to know the difference between drive and reverse.
And state license examiners recently testified in federal court that the school's students were among the worst they had ever seen. In some cases the applicants were told to stop their cars and get out because they represented a menace on the streets.
But many got drivers licenses anyway because instructors had bribed state officials to wink at blunders between December 1997 and November 1999, according to court testimony.
Former students at the New Delhi school who lined up for state-ordered retesting Monday said they had no inkling that their instructors may have been slipping cash to the license examiners.
''I certainly didn't know anything about that,'' said Bamita Shah, a community college student and one of 60 New Delhi graduates who showed up for the last of three days of retesting at the Chicago West center.
''I'm confident about my ability to drive,'' the 20-year-old said as she waited with about a dozen others for a test.
Results suggest Secretary of State Jesse White was right to order the retesting. Officials said of the 63 motorists who were called in Monday, 60 showed up, 37 passed and 23 flunked.
Officials said that, in all, only 77 of the 470 New Delhi students ordered to retest could keep their licenses. The list of New Delhi students had been supplied by federal prosecutors, spokesman David Druker said.
The discovery of problems at New Delhi, a school that catered to immigrants from India, stemmed from a federal investigation of widespread corruption in the drivers licensing program.
Numerous unqualified truck drivers were granted Illinois licenses because officials were paid, authorities say. And federal prosecutors say $170,000 of the payoff money was funneled into Gov. George Ryan's campaign fund. Ryan, who as secretary of state for eight years oversaw the licensing program, has not been accused of wrongdoing.
Bharat Patel, 51, one of the New Delhi operators, was sentenced last month to 37 months in prison for bribery. Former license examiners admitted on the witness stand that they passed his students after taking cash that he twisted around door handles and slipped under floor mats.
So far, 37 people have been charged in the government's two-year investigation. Of those, 29 have pleaded guilty and two have been convicted.
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On the Net:
Illinois' Secretary of State: http://www.sos.state.il.us