After witnessing violations of traffic rules along all roads in Tirunelveli and Palayamkottai despite their sustained awareness programmes, the city police have decided to enforce road safety rules stringently.
Speaking to reporters after a police control room was opened at Murugankurichi in Palayamkottai on Wednesday, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Tirunelveli East) V. R. Srinivasan said the police were registering up to 1,500 traffic rule violation cases in the city every day for not wearing helmet, not fastening seat belts in cars, overloading, over-speeding, driving the vehicles without licence and other documents, etc. Vehicles being driven by underage riders were being taken to police station and they were released only after the parents of the violators gave a written undertaking that they would not allow their underage children to ride bikes or drive cars anymore.
As part of the measures taken by the police to strictly enforce road safety rules along all the roads, especially along the busy stretch between Murugankurichi and the Collectorate, in morning and evening hours, CCTV cameras had been installed along this road. To intensify this drive further, the police control room had been established at Murugankurichi, where one-way traffic system was being violated at will by the vehicle users, particularly by two-wheeler riders, throughout the day, he said.
He warned that vehicles fitted with the banned air horns would be fined up to ₹1,500 and informed that NCC cadets and NSS volunteers would be trained in traffic regulation to be deployed at busy junctions and on roads.
When Mr. Srinivasan saw a few bike riders with helmet crossing Murugankurichi, he congratulated them with ‘halwa’ while warning those who did not wear the head safety gear.
Even as Mr. Srinivasan went to open the newly established police control room, he saw Traffic Police Head-constable Gowri regulating vehicular traffic at a distance and asked her to open the control room equipped with a public address system, CCTV cameras and monitor with recorder.
