Navi Mumbai played a safe Holi

Thanks to the heavy bandobast and adequate precautionary measures by the Navi Mumbai police, the satellite city witnessed a peaceful Holi this year.

Various communities celebrated the festival in their own traditional way across the city, but no untoward incident was reported anywhere till late evening.

"We directed our officials to take stern action against those found over speeding, jumping signals and rash driving and of course, drink driving, during the course of the celebration. Though we mainly focused on bikers, other motorists, too, were not spared. The number of revellers were also less on roads this year," said Vijay Patil, deputy commissioner of police (traffic).

The police teams were deployed at all important junctions of the city and also on the arterial roads to nab errant motorists. "We took extensive measures to ensure that no untoward incidents like rioting, molestation, eve-teasing take place in the city during the celebrations. The entire city was kept under surveillance and there were 3 to 5 patrolling teams under every police station.

Along with this, our men ensured that women official are surrounded by their male colleagues, so that they do not fall prey to gangs of inebriated revellers," said Suresh Mengade, DCP (zone I).
Holi was also celebrated with enthusiasm in the areas like Kharghar, Kamothe, Khandeshwar, Kalamboli and Panvel too. Sanjay Yenpure, deputy commissioner of police (zone II) said, "In our area we had equal crowds on the roads and public places as we used to see in the previous years. Apart from nakabandis and beat marshal teams, we also kept a reserved force at every police station for handling the emergency cases. Fortunately, our jurisdiction went calm and quiet and no criminal case was registered at any police station."

Even the railway police were on alert for last two to three days. PM Karyakarte, senior police inspector of Vashi GRP said, "Our officials were roaming both on the platforms as well as on the tracks to make sure that no one throws water balloons and other stuff to the moving trains. RPF officials also helped us in this drive throughout the celebrations."