The data released by the Mumbai Traffic Police shows that more Mumbaikars were penalised for obstruction of the free flow of traffic and jumping signals in the year 2022 than in 2021. However, in a good light, the data also reveals that 2022, the year when the city was thrown open in full after a hectic year of Covid-19 lockdown, cases of underage driving, triple seat driving, fancy unauthorised number plates, talking on mobile phones and entering in a one-way route have all come down drastically.
The traffic authorities shared the data for the two years, 2021 and 2022 with this newspaper which reflects a head-wise action of both years. The total number of vehicles being penalised and the total number of e-challan registered has declined from 63.16 lakh to Rs51.66 lakh. The traffic police recovered a whopping Rs 3,98,11,56,750 in the previous year, which is higher than the year 2021, when it recovered Rs 2,22,67,44,100.
In terms of the number of total cases registered, 2021 saw 80,66,736, which came down to 58,01,902 in the year 2022.
“The lockdown year had less public on road, while the strength of traffic cops was the same. Our priority is road safety and that is our only goal,” said Pravin Padwal, the joint commissioner of police (traffic), adding that Mumbaikars are now even more careful with road and traffic regulations.
The data states that the cases of underage driving have reduced from 526 in 2021 to 391 in 2022, similarly, with triple-seat driving, the numbers have gone down from 28,501 to 13,189. The number of fancy number plate cases reduced to 25,389 from 60,363. In terms of talking on mobile phones while driving, 2021 saw 38,636 cases which came down to 24,108 in the following year. Vehicles entering the ‘no entry’ zone in a one-way route were a whopping 6,62,681, it came down to 3,37,969 in the following year.
Mentioning the flipside, cases of obstruction to the free flow of traffic have increased from 9,56,955 in 2021 to 12,94,433 in 2022. The cases for jumping signals have also subsequently jumped from 3,41,930 to 3,78,990. Cases of honking have tremendously increased from merely 636 cases to a whopping 40,999 cases. For carrying excess passengers over the provided limit, 48,385 vehicles were penalized in 2021, which jumped to 78,921 in the following year.
Driving without a helmet, among the 2-wheelers, too, has increased from 8,41,982 to 12,12,364, while for the 4-wheelers, cases of motorists not wearing seat-belts (front seat) have also essentially increased from 95,079 in 2021 to 2,22,174 in 2022.
Seat belts for others excluding the driver, which was only 50 in the year 2021, have increased to 1,21,537 last year. Mumbai Police, along with Traffic police last year, made it mandatory for all passengers in a car to wear seat belts after the unfortunate death of businessman Cyrus Mistry who died in an accident on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Highway on September 4, 2022.
Road accident in Mumbai
2017 – 3070
2018 – 3069
2019 – 2756
2020 – 1727
2021 – 2061
2022 – 1738
Jan, 2023 - 46
