Traffic challans may follow you home - Ahmedabad

The city traffic police have again revived the e-challan project under which challans for traffic infringements will be delivered to offenders on their doorstep. Interestingly, this will be done in collaboration with international agencies. Senior officials of traffic police indicated that the new system will be launched as a pilot project from June 2015. The existing database of vehicle owners has been updated for the purpose, said senior officers.

Harikrishna Patel, additional commissioner of police (traffic), said that efforts were being made to conduct road surveillance electronically through a network of CCTV cameras integrated with traffic signals.

"The work is being done in collaboration with various agencies. The new system will also generate e-challans. What is required for the project is a specialized network linked through software with database of vehicle users at RTO, and to the system of offender identification. This project will be implemented as part of the overall plans to improve the city," said Patel.

Some initiatives already form part of the Rs 11-crore memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in 2013 between Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).

Mapping trouble spots

Other initiatives taken up by the traffic police include a software analysis system for traffic jams and personnel appraisal. Senior officials said that they have started collating data from various sources to understand the trouble spots and map them. The data is being collected from such sources as 1095-traffic helpline, 100-city police control room, complaints on Facebook page and WhatsApp group and direct response from citizens in the form of letters and emails.

Monitoring personnel

The traffic police have also developed software to keep track of personnel. "We got to know about some rowdy behaviour on the road and also about personnel moving out of their jurisdiction to collect fines. To prevent their recurrence, we have devised a system where the software keeps track of deployed personnel and their physical presence," said an official.

Illegal parking major worry

The Ahmedabad Traffic Consultative Committee (ATCC) organized a public discussion on the topic, 'Traffic Discipline and Citizens', at Ahmedabad Management Association (AMA) on Saturday. Senior traffic officials and prominent citizens participated in the discussions on traffic-related issues.

Gauri Wagenaar of ATCC said that they wanted to bring the traffic police and members of the public on the same platform. "It was a healthy discussion on pertinent questions. People also got to know about the police perspective on different issues. When we can campaign for higher turnout in polls, why not for better traffic conditions?" she said.

The major issues for citizens were illegal parking on the roads and hawkers causing traffic jams in the absence of a concrete policy. Bottlenecks caused by BRTS tracks, behaviour of traffic police, the fine system and lack of coordination between various agencies involved in traffic management were the other concerns of citizens.