PESHAWAR, Oct 10: Traffic police officials have been imposing on-the-spot penalties in clear violation of the Provincial Motor Vehicles Act 1999.
The act, which was approved by the provincial assembly on Sept 22, 1999, states that a police officer has to draw up charges in a form ‘J’ and the offender has right to go to the court within seven days against the charges.
Through the act, amendments were made to Section 116-A of the Motor Vehicle Ordinance 1965, which says: “A police officer not below the rank of Sub-Inspector shall draw up charges form ‘J’ and forthwith deliver four copies thereof to the offender and within 24 hour forward the fifth copy of the charge to the court having jurisdiction to try the offence and retain the sixth copy for record.”
The act adds that the person charged with an offence under this section shall, if he does not want to contest the charge, pay fine within seven days from the date of delivery of the charge to him.
But the traffic police, setting aside the government rules, issue tickets and receive fine on the spot, and sometimes they also seize driving licenses or vehicles’ documents.
Jehangir Khan and Ali Gohar, president and general secretary of a transport union, had filed a petition in the Peshawar High Court in 1999 against the traffic police for imposing on-the-spot fine on the traffic rules violators.
The High Court in its judgment on Feb 5, 2000, had directed the respondents in the case — the law and home departments, IGP and senior traffic police officials — to strictly abide by Section 116-A of the Provincial Motor Vehicles Act 1999.
Sources said the DIG traffic had allowed also the traffic constables to fine the traffic offenders on the spot, which was a violation of the law.
Acting SP Traffic Ghulam Hussain while talking to Dawn said: “Yes, according to the rules no traffic police official below the rank of sub-inspector can impose penalties on the traffic violators, but the traffic police is presently short of its strength. Therefore, the constables have been given shoulder promotions to the rank of sub-inspector and allowed to fine the traffic offenders on the spot.”
“If the traffic police promote all the constable to the rank of sub-inspector, the government finance department will not be able to afford raise in their salaries,” he opined.
The sources alleged that all those traffic constable who were working as the sub-inspectors to generate money for the government were not being paid their five per cent commission against the on-the-spot fines for the last three months.
Delay in the payment of commission was a routine matter, but they would be paid, Ghulam Hussain said.
He informed Dawn that since Jan 1, 2002, to Aug 15, 2002, the traffic police had held 160,000 vehicles responsible for rules violations and imposed a fine of over Rs200 millions on them.