500 teens booked for 'laheriya-cut' biking in Jan

PATNA: Rash bikers, beware! City cops are on the prowl to rein in reckless drivers and make them poorer by a thousand bucks.
A cell has been formed and given a mandate to prevent, what is known in common parlance as, “laheriya-cut driving” usually resorted to by teen bikers. Formed on December 30 last year, the cell is helmed by deputy SP (law and order) Lalit Mohan Sharma and consists of five sub-inspectors and five constables who move in uniform in localities selected randomly.Their intelligence colleagues in mufti are also mobile in other localities and the two teams share inputs to ensure effective functioning.
“We have so far booked 500-odd bikers who were zigzagging on the road,” Sharma told TOI and added such reckless drivers are also fined for violation of other traffic rules like not wearing a helmet and not possessing registration or insurance papers or driving licence (DL).
Under the Motor Vehicle Act, traffic police have powers to impose a fine of up to Rs 1,000 on drivers indulging in rash driving. While a sum of Rs 500 is realised from a driver not possessing a DL, drunken driving is punished with a fine of up to Rs 3,000. If the vehicle doesn’t have a proper registration number, its driver may be fined up to Rs 300. And if you are caught talking over your cellphone while driving, you may end up paying a fine of Rs 300.
“Minors are not licensed to drive. But we even caught minors who were riding motorcycles and speeding,” the DSP said and admitted that the city cops are not equipped with either speed guns or breathalysers. “But we can make out who is speeding and who is drunken,” Sharma said.
These violators of traffic rules are fined and let off with a warning for the first two times. If caught for a third time, an FIR is lodged against the offender. In case of minors, not only a penalty of up to Rs 500 is realised from them but their parents are also summoned and warned.
Sharma and his team have done a survey and found that it is the stretch from Gandhi Maidan to the airport which mostly witnesses reckless driving. “We have also received information about a game of betting on bikers’ speed. But we are yet to trace the gang,” he said and appealed to the people to send any input about this gang or any other violation of traffic rules to the Helpline number 94318 18398.
Patna SSP B S Meena is serious about ending this bikers’ menace. “If a biker ignores our signal to stop, we have a mechanism in place to help policemen pounce upon him at the very next signal,” Meena said.