The Madras High Court on Friday called for the closed circuit television (CCTV) camera footage from three important roads in the city to find out whether the number of cases booked by the police for various kinds of road traffic violations match the actual number of violations.
A Division Bench of Justices S. Manikumar and Subramonium Prasad directed Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) to submit, by July 12, the CCTV camera footage shot on July 2 at Anna Salai beginning from Kathipara Junction in Guindy to the statue of Thomas Munro near the Island Grounds. They also ordered production of CCTV camera footage shot at Kamarajar Salai beginning from from Malar hospital in Adyar till the Reserve Bank of India office close to the Secretariat, as well as the visuals from Poonamalee High Road.
The judges wanted to watch the videos and find out whether the police personnel were vigilant enough to check the violations and initiate action against erring motorists. They said, the visuals would prove whether there was really any stringent action against traffic violations.
The interim order was passed after Additional Advocate General P.H. Arvindh Pandian informed that the police had been issuing challans on the basis of monitoring done through CCTV cameras and around 90,000 violations had been reported in Anna Nagar alone. He pointed out that the violations included rash driving, speeding, jumping signals, crossing the stoplines, not wearing helmets, more than two people riding on two-wheelers, driving on the wrong side, violating one-way traffic and so on.
However, the judges said, the police appeared to have failed in their duty to take stringent action against pillion riders without helmets. They, nevertheless, were quick to add that there had been a small progress in the public’s mindset after the court began cracking the whip.
“Today I saw four pillion riders wearing helmets. I also saw two policemen not wearing helmets,” the senior judge in the Division Bench said and stressed that all pillion riders would fall in line only if the policemen show some interest in enforcing the law.
The Bench has been passing a series of orders to ensure that both riders on two-wheelers were made to wear helmets, as against the existing practice of only the riders alone wearing helmets, ever since it began hearing a connected public interest litigation petition.
The petitioner K.K. Rajendran had sought for a direction to the police for strict implementation of the helmet rule as well as the need for car passengers to wear seat belts.