In just 1 week, Bengaluru traffic police collect Rs 72 lakh in fines under new Act

Bengaluru, Sep 09: As hefty challans continue to be handed to erring motorists across the country, the Bengaluru city traffic police has collected a whopping amount of over Rs 72 lakh as fines under the new Motor Vehicles Act from September 4 to September 9 until 10 am.

The amendments to the MV Act 1988 kicked in earlier this month. The highest fines have been collected in traffic violations related to not wearing helmet, pillion not wearing helmet and using mobile phones while riding. The traffic police recorded 2,645 such cases since September 4, which resulted in collection of Rs 26,45,000 in fines.

Traffic police officials collected Rs 72, 49,900 in fines in the same period i.e over Rs 18 lakh collected as fines per day.

Traffic police officials also clarified that motorists in the city can show the documents stored on Digilocker, the national Digital Locker System, during traffic police checks and that they need not necessarily show a hard copy of the original documents.

The Bengaluru traffic police has conducted several awareness campaigns on the new Motor Vehicles Act through social media and media, and has also held training for traffic police, the officer said.

Reacting to the hefty fines being imposed, former chief minister Siddaramaiah has said that it is not a good idea to impose heavy fines.