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Traffic police and Harrasement
Written By vinaykariappa - 25 June, 2009
Traffic Bangalore Complaint Enforcement Fines Harassment Transportation Enforcement
Day before yesterday i was caught by traffic police ASI Hanumanthraju near Kadrenahalli 100ft ring road, Banashankari and i was asked to produce the documents, its unfortunate my emission test was expired and then ASI and constable asked to pay the fine of Rs 300 in the court i asked y so much then he told me to pay Rs 100 on spot, I paid and left for office later i realized he has given the slip for lane discipline in spite of giving for emission.
Then one of my colleague showed the newspaper in that it is mentioned they are not supposed to impose fine for the Emission test and insurance in spite of that they should given notice in which i have to produce the document within 15 days. In front of my eyes he has collected Rs200 from one of my colleague for the Insurance without giving the receipt.
Today I met him again and asked why he imposed wrong fine on me and all the 3 police man acted like as if they dont know about the notification of changes made to the emission and the insurance certificates. Finally they asked me to bring the News paper in which the notification was released. I left the spot and rushed to office to bring the paper, i collected the paper and rushed back to their spot but in vain as they had already fled from the spot. I dont know higher authority will take action on this or not i tried to take video of our conversation but only voice got recorded properly. If Cops are like this definitely India will improve hats off to cops of our nation for troubling common people.
COMMENTS
murali772 - 25 June, 2009 - 11:29
Way to go, Vinay. I expect you'll hear from higher officials soon. If you don't hear within a week, please bring up the matter here again. We'll take it to the specific attention of the higher ups.
Muralidhar Rao
vinod_shankar - 25 June, 2009 - 11:46
vinay, what you said is very true, you have every reason to complain to the higher authorities. I am sure many including me were not aware of this provision to produce within 15 days, both insurance and emission.
So, the truth is only RC and Driving License can be verified on spot. Please see point (3)
Section 130 of MV Act, 1988 - Duty to produce license and certificate of registration
(1) The driver of a motor vehicle in any public place shall, on demand by any police officer in uniform, produce his licence for examination: Provided that the driver may, if his licence has been submitted to, or has been seized by, any officer or authority under this or any other Act, produce in lieu of the licence a receipt or other acknowledgement issued by such officer or authority in respect thereof and thereafter produce the licence within such period, in such manner as the Central Government may prescribe to the Police officer making the demand.
(2) The conductor, if any, of a motor vehicle on any public place shall on demand by any officer of the Motor Vehicles Department authorized in this behalf, produce the licence for examination.
(3) The owner of a motor vehicle (other than a vehicle registered under Section 60), or in his absence the driver or other person-in-charge of the vehicle, shall, on demand by a registering authority or any other officer of the Motor Vehicles Department duly authorized in this behalf, produce the certificate of insurance of the vehicle and, where the vehicle is a transport vehicle, also the certificate of fitness referred to in Section 56 and the permit; and if any or all of the certificates or the permit are not in his possession, he shall, within 15 days from the date of demand, submit photo copies of the same, duly attested in person or send the same by registered post to the officer who demanded it.
vinod
silkboard - 25 June, 2009 - 14:31
The root cause of all this is the fact that money changes hands on the spot. If you replace that with the system where the cop only gives you a voucher or a ticket, and you then go pay at BangaloreOne, or on Traffic Police website, then the problem of wrong fine amounts, fine without proper or legal receipt - all that could go away.
Even after eliminating the "on the spot" cash transaction, corruption and harassment will still exist. But the moment you see cash in a traffic cop's hands, you would know what is happening. In fact, since going and paying up at BangaloreOne would take more time, more and more people might want to bribe and "settle".
If you add one more change to the RTO procedures, things can get even better. Change from life-time registration to annual road tax/registration system will give Cops more contral. All unpaid fines can be added on to the annual road tax bill.
Back to the law, notice tis:
within 15 days from the date of demand, submit photo copies of the same, duly attested in person or send the same by registered post to the officer who demanded it.
Notice that you don't really have to go in person as well. Get postal address of the officer, and mail the documents to him - that too should be enough.
mrmaulik - 26 June, 2009 - 07:07
Thanks to bringout such imp. issues with all of us. and also i would like to thanks others who had already given good guidance for rules and laws.
Its a difficult to get real sence law implimentation from our cops specially at lower cader. We know that and also accepted corruption is a part of our culcture (and not as part of system).
But i have some questions. who is responsible for this?? plz. dont mind if iam asking why u dont have emission test report done before it expired? why yr friend dont have all required papers with him?? and let me know why your frined left the place wihout taking receipt? we are equally responsible by giving them bribe..
I know my post and reaction may not like to so many of us.. but we need to really think for this also..
Rithesh - 25 June, 2009 - 16:31
Great post Mr Vinay - thanks for sharing your experience and also highlighting what the law states. I would strongly suggest that you follow up on this and if possible go and meet the ACP at the station itself. And please post the update too.
Till i read this post i was under the impression that we could also be fined for not producing the insurance documents on demand. I overheard about this fine (of Rs.100) at a police check point when i was stoped for document verification.
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