Karnataka   

Better transport facilities needed during night Law & order

Lack of adequate public transport facilities during the night and early hours has been indirectly contributing to an increase in the number of crimes in the city.

Unable to get Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) buses to reach their destinations during the night and early hours of the day, citizens stranded at night without transport are often tempted to hitch a ride with strangers, sometimes with hazardous consequences.

Taking advantage of the situation, drivers of cabs on hire to IT companies, call centres and business process outsourcing (BPO) units have robbed over 100 people in the past one year on the pretext of giving them a lift.

With the Hebbal police arresting a six-member gang of call centre drivers, it has come to light that on August 23 the gang kidnapped and murdered a 26-year-old man on pretext of giving him a lift from Marathalli to Koramangala.

While admitting that there has been an increase in such incidents, Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Gopal B. Hosur says that 90 per cent of these crimes have been solved. “But stern measures should be taken to prevent such incidents,” he notes.

According to Mr. Hosur, the accused in most of the cases are cab drivers of call centres and BPOs.

Most of these cases have been reported in and around Whitefield and Electronics City in the city’s IT corridor, falling under the jurisdiction South-East division police.

Mr. Hosur and Deputy Commissioner of Police (South-East) Soumendu Mukherjee say that the BMTC should operate more buses in this belt, particularly during the odd hours.

Non-availability of buses is the main reason for the public to take lift in vehicles driven by strangers, they point out.

Mr. Hosur suggests that companies that work during odd hours should arrange proper transport facility to its employees. Also, people should not take lift in vehicles belonging to strangers.

Given the huge number of call centre and BPO cabs that ply on the city roads during the night and early hours, it is difficult to screen the vehicles or conduct “nakabandi.”

The police would take steps to effectively implement the existing order banning fixing of tinted glasses to private transport vehicles with yellow board, he said.

In fact, the police had banned tinted glasses after a call centre executive Prathiba Srikanta Murthy was raped and murdered allegedly by her company cab driver, Shiva Kumar, on the outskirts of the city some two years ago.

After Prathiba’s murder, the police had instructed all travel agencies in the city to keep a record of its drivers and also check their antecedents.

Apparently, this has not helped much in checking crimes by drivers, as all those who have been arrested are first-time offenders who did not have criminal antecedents, Mr. Hosur added.

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