Cops stop using Android devices for issuing e- challans on the spot

NAVI MUMBAI: The traffic police started on the spot e-challan in Navi Mumbai as pilot project for the first time in Maharashtra in January last year. But, it turned out to be big flop.

The city traffic department has not been using the android devices to issue such challans for the past three to four month because of expenses incurred by the system.

The state IT department had provided them 16 Android devices for this project. Traffic officials equipped with such devices and printers would observe the motorists on the roads and issue the challan if they spotted anyone violating the norms.

The driver’s licence number and registration number of his vehicle would appear in the printed challan. There are 15 traffic units in Navi Mumbai and each unit was given one such device for penalising the errant motorists.

Arvind Salve, deputy commissioner of police ( traffic) said, “The Android device has one SIM card in it and its bill come every month- end. As it was a pilot project, the state used to pay those bills. However, for some reasons they have not been paying the bills and so we are now not using those devices.”

When asked if there was any plan of restarting the system, he said, “As of now the Mumbai traffic cops are using the different system for issuing e-challans. So we too may try something like that, but nothing has been decided so far.”

The traffic cops are continuing to issues e-challans with the help of CCTV cameras. “We are issuing around 15 such e-challans every day,” an officer from police control room said.