The police in the State capital, despite being equipped with enough resources, instead of utilising them, continues to complain that there are hurdles in streamlining the city’s traffic due to lack of equipment.
For lack of resources for monitoring and curb over speeding, traffic police are not utilising resources worth lakhs of rupees.
Few machines of police are in dilapidated conditions in want of proper maintenance. These resources are not being used and it has resulted in a large number of accidents caused due to high speed.
Traffic DSP Basant Kaul (HQ) said that the speed
gun radar machine occupies a lot of space due to which
this machine is not being used frequently.
He said proposal for purchase of new interceptor machine is under process and would be purchased after
the proposal in approved at headquarters level. He did not have any knowledge
about the old machine that is gathering dust in want of maintenance.
The accident figures of the city show a grim picture. From January to September 2015, 2,453 accidents, 1,936 injured, 153 seriously injured and 158 deaths were reported but seriousness in taking measures to address the increased number of accidents by errant drivers is still awaited.
Kaul informed that the three cranes provided by the BMC that were being used for lifting vehicles obstructing the smooth flow of traffic, have halted after their contract ended and likely to be used after the contract is renewed, he added.
A crane provided by Ministry of Road Transport and Highway worth Rs20 lakh has not been used after it faced mechanical issues in the lack of maintenance.
Similarly, the interceptor machine which was provided by the transport department few years ago has been dumped for the past three years in the garage waiting for repair. The machine is worth Rs14 lakh which is used to trace speeding vehicles and is equipped with highly advanced gadgets. Initially it was used but later in the lack of proper maintenance it faced problems and stopped functioning.
The speed-gun Radar machine worth Rs 7 lakh has been kept in the store for the past one year to be operated but still it is yet to be used properly and frequently.