NAGPUR: Nagpur city's traffic may be bursting at the seams. But the same cannot be said of the city's traffic police that faces a perpetual staff crunch. Far from adding to its strength in view of explosive growth of vehicle population and spread of the city, the traffic department of the city police do not even have the existing sanctioned strength. The only assistant commissioner of police (ACP) in the traffic department N C Hirekhan, has been recently transferred to Bhamragarh as Sub Divisional Police Officer (SDPO).
Sources said when the traffic department of city police was formed, it was given one post of deputy commissioner police (DCP), two posts of ACPs, seven police inspectors, two assistant police inspectors, 26 police sub-inspectors, 29 assistant sub-inspectors, 106 head constables and 405 constables.
Despite the fact that the vehicular traffic in the city has doubled in the recent past, the strength of the police force remains the same. Many posts are lying vacant in the department. Right now the department is short of two ACPs, two PIs, one API, 26 PSIs, seven ASIs, and 182 constables.
The post of its chief DCP (traffic) was only recently filled with Harish Chavan posted there. Interestingly it has an excess of head constables. Against 106 posts sanctioned, currently the department has 150 head constables.
"The vehicular population in Nagpur including both city and rural areas has crossed 12 lakh. However, the Maharashtra home department has failed to provide enough traffic cops to deal with this," alleged Tushar Mandlekar, secretary, International Society for Road Transport and Safety.
The city has also witnessed tremendous rise in traffic violation cases. According to traffic police, till July 31 this year, the department had registered 1,45,568 cases and recovered Rs 2.21 crore as fine in traffic cases. Similarly, in 2007, the department had booked 2.56 lakh violators and collected Rs 4.14 crore as fines. In 2006, the department initiated action against 2.11 lakh violators while collecting Rs 2.90 crore as fine while in 2005 the number was 1.76 lakh and Rs 2.13 crore respectively. In 2004, 1.73 lakh violators were booked and Rs 1.73 crore collected from them. This when only a fraction of the violations that take place are actually booked.
Mandlekar expressed concern that staff crunch had now become a regular feature for the department. He was also angry that traffic police personnel were being deployed for VIP bandobast and security. "Criminals of every hue now use vehicles. If the department were equipped with adequate manpower, many crimes can be solved or even prevented," he added. The department recently got 30 police personnel sanctioned by former city police chief Satyapal Singh. The new DCP traffic Harish Chavan could not be contacted.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Nagpur/Shortage_of_cops_adds_to_traffic_woes/articleshow/3347383.cms
