No traffic penalty points yet

Demonetisation also brings down number of spot challans issued by police

Nearly three months after the Telangana state government issued a G.O, traffic cops and officials of the Transport department are yet to implement the ‘penalty points system’ which prescribes cancellation of driving licence for continued traffic rules violations.

Traffic cops have even slowed down the issuing of spot challans after demonetisation. The enforcement against violation of helmet rule, too, has slowed down and more numbers of bikers are visibly hitting the road without wearing helmets.

Though traffic cops said they have only slowed down spot booking and that echallans are being issued to be issued for violation of traffic rules, road safety activists came down heavily saying that the biggest drawback with traffic cops is they don’t enforce any rule strictly for a long period of time.

It is because of discontinuation of special drives that motorists have developed the notion that no rule is going to be enforced continuously or at least for a long time, said Indian Road Safety Federation chief functionary Vinod Kumar Kanumala.

“This time the reason is demonetisation slowing down enforcement. Earlier there were elections. There is one reason or another. Most of the rules including the negative points system have remained on paper. First of all, traffic cops, transport department officials and the powers that be in the government should discuss and decide whether any rule being proposed by them is practically possible to be implemented on the road,” he said.

Social worker T.S. Gupta said that while the decision to slow down on spot challan may have been taken on humanitarian grounds as people having cash would like to first spend it on basic needs at home, traffic cops could have gone ahead with spot booking and issued challans as motorists would pay them once cash flow improves in the market.