Despite ban, traffic cops allow trucks along ORR

Techies commuting to Bellandur and South Bengaluru are irked by the traffic police’s failure to stop heavy transport vehicles from driving inside the city.

They say the Bangalore Traffic Police (BTP) do not enforce restrictions on Heavy Transport Vehicles (HTVs) to drive on the Outer Ring Road (ORR) during the day time, adversely affecting the traffic movement and forcing many techies to reach their offices only by the second half of the day.

The problem has been affecting commuters on the ORR for the past two weeks, aggravating the already slow traffic movement.

“Traffic grinds to a halt if the trucks break down. Vehicles get stranded on the road for two to three kilometres. The Google Maps of the commuters always shows red,” Shashi, who has been commuting from JP Nagar to ITPL along the stretch for the past 20 years, told DH. He said BTP does not clear the broken down trucks and ensure smooth traffic flow.

“They conduct routine checks, but allow HTVs after collecting a fine. Our question is: when there is a ban, how can such vehicles be allowed? Should the traffic police collect a fine or implement the rules?” asked Architha, a resident of HSR Layout.

Shashi said BTP does not have towing vehicles to clear the stranded HTVs and the trucks are moved away only by the tow vans owned by the Outer Ring Road Companies Association (ORRCA).

“Traffic police on this jurisdiction are only active on Twitter,” he said, showing a screen-shot of the conversation he had with DCP East (Traffic) Jagadeesh.

“I tried to escalate the issue (with the jurisdictional DCP and ACP), but I received lame responses. This only shows how serious they are about the issue,” Shashi said.

Despite BTP’s claims on Twitter that HTVs are banned on the road, commuters countered their tweets by posting instances of HTVs driving along.

DH made several attempts to get the reaction of Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) P Harishekaran, but the attempts went in vain.