The city police have decided to get strict with those found repeatedly indulging in drink-driving. Those who commit the offence more than once may lose their licence and even end up behind bars.
According to the new rules, a person caught drinking and driving for the first time will have to shell out about Rs2,000 as fine. The amount is the court fee. “If the person is caught the second time for the same offence, the police will seek harsher punishment in the charge-sheet filed in court,” additional commissioner of police (traffic) Praveen Sood said.
“The fine will be increased. The police will seek enhanced punishment, even imprisonment or suspension of driving licence, for the offender,” he said.
The traffic cops, empowered by Blackberrys, are keeping count of the number of cases booked against erring motorists. “We will not be lenient with those repeatedly found drinking and driving,” Sood said. “For the pleasure of a few youngsters, we can’t risk the lives of hundreds of innocent people on the streets,” he said.
“The Blackberry will alert the police if a person is caught the second time.”
The city police decided to come up with stricter laws alarmed by the high number of drink-driving cases. This year, till July, the police had booked 40,683 cases of drink-driving.
Sood said people caught drink-driving would have to leave their vehicles and documents with the police. The vehicles and documents would be released only after the offenders pleaded guilty in court and paid the fine, he said.
Lawyers, however, said that cases of drink-driving had increased because the police were not implementing the existing laws strictly. The police usually allowed offenders to drive on after just imposing a fine on them, the lawyers said.
The offenders were rarely produced in court. Also, the fine that the cops collected was usually double the court fee; they pocketed the extra money, the lawyers alleged.
“The police are supposed to collect only the court fee as fine from those found drink-driving,” Manik Lal M Dhongadi, an advocate, said. “But a few police officers are making a lot of money by collecting inflated fine amounts.
When they find a person with high alcohol content in blood, they scare him saying his vehicle would be seized and that he would have to spend hours together in court if a case was booked against him. When the driver seeks a way out, the cops demand double the fine amount and release him without seizing his vehicle or documents,” the advocate alleged.
Some cases do get registered in court, but the cops get proxy witnesses to plead guilty and sign on behalf of the real offenders, lawyers said. “More than 300 such cases are disposed of every Monday in the Mayo Hall court alone, but only a few motorists turn up in court to plead guilty. These cases help the police make a lot of money,” claimed Praveen Mishra, a senior advocate.
Deputy commissioner of police (west traffic) Panduranga H Rane, however, refuted the allegations. “While dealing with a drink-driving case, we check the physical condition of the person. If he is in a stable condition, we register a case, take the documents and allow the person to go. But if he is high on alcohol, we seize the vehicle. We then ask someone else to take him home, or else engage an auto to drop him home.”
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