Hefty fines fail to keep motorists in check

Warangal: Even though the traffic violations were costing a bomb, motorists appear to be little bothered about it. The number of violation cases registered in this year indicates that people have scant respect for the traffic rules. The official data tells that a whopping 8.39-lakh traffic violation cases have been booked in the Warangal Police Commissionerate limits in this year till date.

While two-wheel motorists dominate the total number of cases with 6.71-lakh, close to them was 1.31-lakh chauffeurs of four-wheelers. A lion share of two-wheel drive violation cases (nearly 5-lakh) comes under 'rider not wearing helmet'. In the four-wheel segment, over one lakh violations were registered under 'over-speeding and dangerous driving'. This apart, over 10,000 cases of over-speeding by bike riders is also a cause of concern for the traffic police as the Commissionerate had recorded 900 road accidents which resulted in the death of nearly 350 people.

In all, a penalty of Rs 26.22 crore was slapped on motorists for infringing traffic rules. According to officials, the amount of penalties soared to that level never before. Adding more woes to the traffic chaos was irregular parking by the motorists.

Speaking to The Hans India, Commissioner of Police Tarun Joshi said, "In a bid to regulate ever growing traffic, two more traffic police stations – one each at KUC in Hanumakonda and at Jangaon – to come up. Efforts are also on to traffic police stations in Parkal and Narsampet towns. Our focus is also on ensuring parking zones."

The CCTV cameras play a key role in identifying traffic violations and reasons associated with the road mishaps. We are on it to ensure CCTV cameras at all vantage points with the help of Greater Warangal Municipal Corporation (GWMC), the CP said.

A plan is on the anvil to install 900 fixed CCTV cameras and more than 120 Pan Tilt Zoom (PTZ) cameras besides Automatic number-plate recognition (ANPR) cameras in the GWMC limits which would help the police in crime detection, Tarun Joshi said.

In a recent brainstorming session on traffic woes, the Municipal Commissioner P Pravinya assured the police of providing all such facilities in the redesigning of the integrated command and control centre project conceived by the Greater Warangal Smart City Corporation Limited.