Srinagar, July 8: As if the complaints of rash and negligent driving by tipper drivers weren’t enough that now the load carriers zoom without number plates triggering havoc on the City roads.

DEADLY TREND
 A drive down the City streets particularly during night hours, when the tippers are allowed to ply in the municipal limits, is enough to reveal that a considerable number of the load carriers are without any number plates.
 And those who ship with the registration number, as per the complainants, have either camouflaged the number plates or hid it with mud, particularly in the rare.
 All this keeps the identity of the tippers hidden. This simply means that if the tipper causes accident, it could manage running away scot-free.
 And this is what has happened many a time when people were hit by the speeding tippers but the accused couldn’t be traced, the complainants said.
 In one such case, a few months back, a speeding tipper mowed down a Shopian man outside Civil Secretariat while till now the police has failed to trace the accused.

THE HORRIFIC COMPLAINTS
 Many of those out on streets in the late hours have complained that they are scared to move because of the speeding tippers, which literally prowl on the City streets.
 “The tippers run so rashly that I feel scared and at times to save myself I park my vehicle in some interior lane till the deadly load carriers go away,” said HF Hussain, a resident of Pir Bagh.
 The complainants said the movement of tippers had become “horrific” because they don’t bear any number plates.
 “One would try to jot down the number of a speeding tipper so that the complaint of rash and negligent driving could be forwarded to the concerned. But when there’s no number plate, these load carriers simply become deadly ghosts,” said a lawyer living in Soura area.

THE OFFICIAL SLUMBER
 In a brazen example of negligence, most of the new tippers in orange color don’t bear any number plates on the back.
 “The tipper owners seem to have cleverly mentioned the number on the side of the vehicle so that in case of accident they could manage running away without being identified,” said a former police official requesting not to be named.
 Ironically such deadly tippers include the ones which have special permission of ferrying construction material during daytime. Each time such tippers ferrying macadam or other things enter into the City, their credentials are verified by the traffic cops. But then those on duty seem to slept over the issue of wrongly placed number plates.
 Observers said if police is allegedly at fault, so is the Regional Transport Officer, who should have checked the “deadly negligence”.

OFFICIALS SPEAK
 Despite repeated attempts the RTO couldn’t be contacted for comment.
 A Traffic police official on the other hand while acknowledging the public complaints said: “We are trying our bit. But then there’s a shortage of workforce in our department so we cannot keep a regular check on such tippers. Moreover they (tippers) move in City when we go off.”
 When contacted SP Traffic Srinagar Maqsood Ul Zaman said “We will soon launch a special nocturnal drive against the offenders.”
 To tame the “erring lot” will be a test for the City’s Traffic police head who few days back managed getting over 200 bikers fined in a day during  a special drive against riders without crash helmets.
 “If bikers can to put to task for not taking care of their own lives, why cannot those who rashly drive the tippers that too without number plates?” asked an observer.

'EXTEND NO ENTRY HOURS '
In the wake of surge in traffic and gridlock during evening hours(after 8:30 PM), the civil society has appealed the Divisional Commissioner Dr Asgar Hassan Samoon and the Inspector General of Police Hemant Kumar Lohia to get the No Entry hours extended  for heavy vehicles which venture into the City after 8:30 PM.
 Observers have been of the opinion that the heavy vehicles particularly tippers be allowed to ply only after 11 PM and not 8:30 PM, which they say is peak time of traffic during summers.

Lastupdate on : Fri, 8 Jul 2011 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Fri, 8 Jul 2011 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sat, 9 Jul 2011 00:00:00 IST