VISAKHAPATNAM: Planning to go crazy with your bikes and cars on New Year-eve? Think twice.

The city police is deploying video cameras to keep a watch on reckless driving and rowdyism to prevent revellers from going into a frenzy. Violators will get a rude wake-up call on the New Year's Day and summoned to the police station for appropriate punishment.

``While we (police) want citizens to have fun on New Year-eve, we want to ensure safe and accident-free revelry,'' Police Commissioner V.S.K. Kaumudi told a media conference on Friday. In addition to video cameras, there would be over 160 police pickets at important junctions and 43 mobile teams till the early hours of Sunday.

The citizens would be allowed to celebrate till 1 a.m. on Sunday, but after that they have to clear out.

The city police had also brought out stickers on `safe and accident-free driving' in 2006 to remind constantly drivers of the importance of safety.

Referring to the crime scenario during 2005 (till December 29), Mr. Kaumudi said that the number of FIRs filed and the petitions received had shown a substantial increase compared to the last two years. While the number of FIRs registered was 3,001 in 2003, it was 3,214 in 2004 and 4,231 this year.

Similarly, the number of petitions received went up from 9,592 in 2003 to 9,748 in 2004 and 14,789 in 2005. He said that petitioners were being informed about the status of their complaints from time to time to the extent possible.

Murder-for-gain

All the three murder-for-gain cases reported in the city during the year were detected and property worth Rs.1.38 lakhs out of the total Rs.1.39 lakhs was recovered. Of the two dacoity cases reported, one was detected and of the 20 robbery cases reported this year, 11 were detected and 19 gangsters arrested.

To prevent rusting of recovered stolen vehicles kept at police stations, steps had been taken to announce the registration numbers of the recovered vehicles and arrange handing them over to their rightful owners as per the orders of the court, pending inquiry of the case. The Police Commissioner said that 74 cases were booked against 75 persons under the Copyright (video piracy) Act and 8,635 DVDs were seized this year as against eight in 2004.

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