People wait, fret and fume yet look on helplessly
Mail News Service
Jamshedpur, Dec 26: The Jamshedpur police are adroitly conducting vehicle and arm checks at busy intersections of the city. They are checking papers – good; checking for arms – better; checking for helmets, masks and speeding – best. The amounts being collected as fines for the government coffers is noble and that speaks a lot about the khaki commitment to duty and responsibility. Hats off to the Jamshedpur police for their unwavering attitude.
But the pertinent point is how many ‘gun totters’ have been caught in this exercise to curb crime by nabbing criminals? The general people going about their destinations are being harangued. A case in point is that of Saturday at Sakchi near the Hathi-Ghoda Mandir. Cops lined up and held up two-wheeler riders and made them park in a row along the road. No sooner had the orders been given, the ‘waiting list’ swelled to almost a kilometer long row of mobikes and scooter riders who fretted and fumed but waited helplessly as one police personnel standing at the head of the row slowly and carefully jotted down details of each such rider before letting one go.
The result of this ‘essential’ exercise was that some were late in attending their duties, some missed out on important assignments and the unusual delay caused anxiety for the folks at home. Some of course were ‘intelligent enough’ to skip the ever-growing line by cutting across the opposite end and ‘escaping’ the exercise in patience albeit taking the liberty of breaking traffic norms.
The Kolhan DIG in his rounds of meetings had directed the police to concentrate the checking drive for arms, papers, masks, helmets, speeding and overloads. But he had underlined that while conducting checking, the general people should not be made to go through harrowing times.
The general wayfarers hope that a repeat of the Hathi-Ghoda Mandir type of checking does not recur. The people are keeping their fingers crossed, not against checking, but against the buildup of a ‘concentration camp’ while checking two wheelers.