Bengaluru: Though it was alleged that the Bengaluru Traffic Police ripped-off money from the public in the name of fines for the government, the police strongly defended themselves that there was an increase in the violations of the traffic rules this year and that they had collected a record amount in fines.
According to sources, under several Acts including Motor Vehicle’s Act, Karnataka Police Act, and others, 94.63 lakh cases have been registered between January and November 30, and an amount of Rs 102 Crore has been collected as fines. This amount was Rs 66.97 Crore in 2016. There is a 68 percent increase in the amount collected as fines.
“As per a survey, there were 70 lakh vehicles in the city including 48 lakh two-wheelers until July, 2017. It is found that, for many, it has become a habit to violate traffic rules. Though the police target them and slap a fine on them, they have not learned their lesson”, said Police Commissioner (Traffic) R Hithendra.
According to sources, most of the offenders are those who park their vehicles in ‘No Parking’ zones. This year 20.31 lakh cases have been registered. Most cases were registered for not wearing a helmet, rash driving, lane breaking, not wearing uniforms and negligent driving.
“Now offenders can’t escape from the hands of the police as they have started collecting fines from the residences of the offenders based on the CCTV footage”, he explained. Till date, in 25,115 such cases, Rs 31 Lakh has been collected. “We used to send notices to the addresses of the offenders to pay the fine, but nobody used to respond to that. So, station-wise teams were formed to collect the fine from their doorstep”, he added.
The police had listed out the names of commuters committing maximum offences just two months ago and collected fines from them. Now they have listed out the names 100 more such repeat offenders and are collecting the fine.
