Accused of corruption and towing vehicles willy-nilly, the traffic police, with the help of the Gurugram Metropolitan development Authority (GMDA), have been using an app to streamline the process of clearing city roads of illegally parked vehicles since the beginning of October. The use of technology has borne fruit as the traffic police are being able to tow 250 vehicles every day.
The change came after the GMDA, in September, took over the duty of towing vehicles from the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG) at the behest of the traffic police, and developed an app for internal use to make the process transparent.
“The traffic police have been towing vehicles to address the issue of illegal parking across the city. We are towing around 250 vehicles every day. On some days, the count even reaches 300. Right now, we have at least 12 cranes, but soon we are going to acquire around 50 cranes for the purpose,” Himanshu Garg, GMDA additional chief executive officer (mobility) and deputy commissioner of police (traffic) said.
“The GMDA is managing the initiative through a mobile application. The crane drivers and traffic officials are using the application and they are required to click two pictures at the spot—one of the vehicle while it is parked illegally to identify the site and the other of its registration number,” Garg said.
The traffic police maintain a database of the pictures and the owners of the vehicles can reach out to them on the helpline 1095 to find out about the location of their vehicle.
He added that because of the app, the traffic police have been able to identify at least three spots—including Mehrauli-Gurgaon (MG) Road, Golf Course Road (GCR) and Udyog Vihar—which are worst-hit by illegal parking and account for most vehicles towed per day.
Garg said that earlier motorists used to complain about bribery and corruption on part of crane drivers, and would face a tough time locating their vehicles. “Now, the traffic police can get real time pictures of the offence. The motorist has go to the car yard and pay the fine. Traffic officials present at the car yard update us about the payment through the app. The process ensures that most of the towing is done accurately,” he said.
