Court censure cools police

KOLKATA: Alleged violation of traffic rules by a car assigned to a sitting judge in Calcutta High Court created a storm on Tuesday. An upset chief justice made inquiries and the agitated judge, Maharaj Sinha, insisted that there had been no violation.
Senior police officers were summoned to the high court during the day and given a dressing down while the police shot off a letter to the high court registrar and summoned the errant driver of the car.Police sources said on Monday evening the chief minister’s motorcade had a providential escape during the day when a car carrying Justice Sinha failed to stop at a traffic signal and almost rammed into the CM’s car.
While the police had decided to summon the driver and charge him with dangerous driving, an earlier report in this newspaper wrongly mentioned that a case had been registered against the vehicle.
On Tuesday, however, the police insisted that Justice Sinha’s driver was a habitual offender, defying oneway rules, road dividers and traffic signals regularly.
When contacted, Justice Sinha denied any such incident. “I am a constitutional functionary and was on my way to fulfill my constitutional duty. I was in the car and would have known if there was a violation of traffic rules,� he said.
Justice Sinha said it was his escort vehicle which determined the route and his car was just following it. “Besides,we (VIPs) use the Indian tricolour and siren. How are we to know who is coming from the other side. Violations happened from both sides. If my vehicle was in the wrong, so was the other one,� an agitated Sinha said.
Police, however, contested the statement and maintained that only the chief justice was entitled to a pilot car. The escort car, even if there was one, usually follows the VIP vehicle, they claimed.
“There are no exceptions to traffic rules and we have begun to haul up errant drivers,� claimed deputy commissioner (traffic) M.K. Singh. He said only ‘priority vehicles’ like ambulances on call, school buses, fire engines and the CM’s motorcade, which are merely allowed the right of way. However, police vehicles are known to regularly flout one-way rules and traffic lights. But police said only sergeants on duty are allowed to violate ‘no entry’ signs and traffic lights.
By Tuesday evening, police officers had cooled down after their visit to the high court. The issue, they claimed, had been amicably settled and the driver of the judge would be reprimanded by the high court itself, averting what threatened to be a police versus judiciary row.