With Bengaluru having the highest number of traffic violations across Karnataka, the Commissioner of Traffic and Road Safety is set to launch a drive to address the issue to instill traffic discipline and road sense among motorists.
According to Additional Director General of Police and Commissioner, Traffic and Road Safety, Alok Kumar, the State has witnessed an increase in the number of violations with 3.25 crore violations and ₹ 1,700 crore fine amount pending till March 31. Fine amount of ₹1,425 crore is pending in the Bengaluru city alone.
“An analysis into this issue revealed that the majority of the violators are two-wheeler riders who are not even aware of the pending violations. This is because the notices would not have reached them as the owners of the vehicle have changed and are not reflected on the registration certificate. Even though the notices were served from the traffic department, it does not reach the actual bike user,” Mr. Alok Kumar said.
Due to this, the violation cases pile up, he said, adding that violators with maximum violations of over ₹50,000 fine amount constituted around 27,000 such cases.
Another category are habitual offenders who are aware of the pending violations and continue to ply on road.
A committee comprising the Transport Department, police, and Legal Department officials held a meeting and decided to steps to resolve the pending cases issue.
Discounted schemes
The initiative of discounted schemes launched last year in a phased manner has also not yielded the desired results. According to Mr. Kumar, in the first phase of the 50% discount fine amount, Bengaluru recovered a total of ₹138 crore, but the second and third phases fetched only ₹17 and 12 crore. Though commissionerates like Hubballi-Dharwad, Bengaluru City, and Mangaluru fared well in terms of recovering pending cases, the others failed to achieved similar results due to many reasons.
To tackle the issue effectively, a meeting convened by the committee recently decided to crack the whip and impound the vehicles, and issue court notices to the violators having a maximum number of offences pending against them. The Transport Department officials have been asked to work on the modalities of vehicle seizure and legal action. The drive is likely to start after May 15 across the State in a phased manner. The violators will be issued notice to give them a chance to clear their dues, followed by which their vehicles will be impounded, and their names and details will be published in public before producing them in the court for further procedure.
Meanwhile, senior police officers in the city said that right now, their focus is only on traffic management, but they will switch over to enforcement part to clear the pending cases and dues .
The State police have launched a website (https://t.co/f0wjyib8BI) to facilitate payment of the pending fine amount for the State, except Bengaluru.
