'Down with downtown': Traffic cops find suburbs ‘leisurely, lucrative’

The ‘lure’, sources attribute, are keenness for leisurely duty hours and evading seniors’ eyes when it comes to receiving bribes, though at least a few constables claim it is harassment by senior officials and them being denied of rightful leaves.

Every police station under Greater Chennai Police jurisdiction also has a traffic enforcement wing whose primary job is to regulate traffic and to book violators. While there were always allegations of traffic cops taking bribe — be it simple offences like jumping signal or helmet-less ride or serious ones such as drunk driving — the department brought in a series of measures with the help of technology such as challan devices integrated with PoS machines to collect fine cashless.

However, the complaints of traffic police demanding bribes have not ceased. A senior police official told DT Next that many traffic cops are opting for transfer to suburbs such as Manali, Ambattur, Poonamallee and Tambaram not to be under the radar of senior officials.

“Working in the downtown means they have to constantly on the road since the vehicle movement is more. And there will be VIP movements for which the traffic had to be regulated. But in the suburbs, there are no such problems and they work as they want. Also, we have received a lot of complaints that they demand bribe from heavy truck drivers. We are looking into the allegations,” said the official.

According to the official, each traffic cop’s duty is four hours after which they get to rest for the same period. Even during the four-hour duty, two policemen can choose to stand for two hours between them. To discourage traffic cops applying for transfer within three years, they have been instructed to get the permission of immediate senior officers before coming to the Commissioner’s office for grievance meeting.

However, a few traffic constables DTNext spoke to said their major grievances are not being able to avail eligible leave and harassment by seniors.“We are denied of casual leaves citing staff shortage. To be frank, if we are allowed to take the casual leaves, the number of medical leaves will come down. Just because they deny us one day leave, many opt for one-week medical leave which eventually ends up in shortage of staff,” said a traffic constable, on condition of anonymity.

Another traffic constable said they are not given the basic respect which forces them to move to other departments. “In Mylapore traffic enforcement station alone, many have opted for transfer unable to cope with the pressure from senior officials. Some of them are even ready to work as orderly at IPS officers’ houses instead of working in the traffic wing,” he said.