Thirty days, 1,53,732 cases and close to Rs 2 crore revenue. This is the result of a drive by the City traffic police against violations of the new pillion helmet rule from January 20.
It means, the Bengaluru Traffic Police on an average booked about 320 cases every hour and as many as 5,124 cases daily, considering an 16-hour work day (traffic).
According to the police, the traffic department booked about 26,880 cases for pillion riders not wearing helmets in the first week of enforcement. The cases crossed 50,000 in the second week. In the third and fourth weeks, cases were 30,959 and 38,961 respectively. Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) MA Saleem said the number of violations would drop in the coming days. “The compliance rate has gone up to about 85 percent. All we want is the pillion wearing the helmet not for the fear of law but for safety,” he stressed.
He said the department would act strictly against those who wear helmets without ISI marks. “Right now, we have not fined anyone not wearing ISI-certified helmets. But we will certainly act strictly. Wearing bad helmets is as good as wearing no helmet,” he pointed out.
On the other side, there was no fall in violations related to riders not wearing helmets. The traffic department booked about one lakh cases in 2014 and 2015. The number of cases crossed the 50,000-mark in three months this year.
With criticism of police wearing helmets that cover just their scalp, the Bengaluru Traffic Police have initiated the process of supplying ISI-certified helmets to policemen. Over the past one month, pictures of traffic policemen wearing “half helmet” or riding without helmets were trending on the social media, thus forcing the department to act. Saleem said the department procured about 320 full-helmets last year and will hand over 300 more helmets this month.
“We have directed all the policemen to wear ISI-marked helmets,” he said.
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