Bhubaneswar: The twin city Commissionerate Police is now tightening their belts to roll out the revised traffic rule violation penalty regime as per the mandate of the recently-passed Motor Vehicle (Amendment) Act 2019.
The Act is going to come into force from September 1 according to which the quantum of penalty for traffic rule violations will increase manifold. The traffic police claim that they are all set to implement the new regulations from next week.
According to sources in the department, they are now working on several modalities to undertake the paradigm shift. It has been planned to increase the manpower and checks on the city roads to trace the erring drivers, bikers and others who flout the traffic norms or take them lightly without the fear of law. On the other hand, efforts will be made to enhance the awareness levels of the people about the new penalties.
“We are ready to enter into the new regime. There are likely to be more traffic personnel managing the city streets as we have planned to deploy more cops to check for traffic violations. On the other hand, we also want more awareness among the public and their cooperation with the new rules coming into effect,” Sagarika Nath, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Traffic)
told Orissa POST.
It is learnt that the traffic police department is in the process of upgrading its overall traffic management system for the twin cities to cope with the new rules. A source in the department said that while the traffic cops would be equipped with Point of Sale (PoS) machines for digital transactions for collecting hefty penalties, they will also be armed with more handy devices for better surveillance to catch repeated offenders.
A senior official in the department said, “The department has also ordered mobile smart machines for traffic cops. Such machines soon after entering the vehicle number and licence number can trace the past records of traffic violations. In such cases the repeated violators would not be able to skip paying penalties for rule violations.”
The machines are likely to be introduced in Bhubaneswar by the first week of October. The department, meanwhile, has also pinned its hopes on the drone cameras which they have started using to trace the ‘lane discipline’ violators and other rowdy elements.
If the department sources are to be believed, more cops are also going to be equipped with body cameras from September 1 as the department is anticipating more verbal duels with the traffic cops with the introduction of revised traffic penalties for the citizens.
Such steps are being undertaken to maintain transparency on the actions taken by the department and also to maintain a proof of traffic violations by the erring citizens.
