HYDERABAD: Shaikh Abdul Haque, a retired DRDI scientist of Kanchanbagh, went to a restaurant in Santosh Nagar on October 12 and parked his car outside the establishment for about 10 minutes. When he returned to his car, he found that a penalty of Rs 1,035 was levied on him for illegal parking.
Over a fortnight after the incident, Haque suffered a similar fate at the Madannapet vegetable market in Saidabad on October 30. He parked his car in a road corner for 20 minutes, only to find that he was penalised Rs 635 for illegal parking.
Haque is, however, not alone in bemoaning a lack of parking facilities and overzealous police action hitting them hard with their action on offences.
“It is a huge amount for a pensioner and (paying it) makes even a cup of costly for me,” Haque said.
“If a vehicle is abandoned on a public road for an unduly long time, then it can be fined. The situation has to be seen in totality and common sense should prevail even among police constabulary. But the object of the police here is not to clear obstruction but to squeeze money from the citizens,” Haque alleged.
Besides the parking issue, residents and commuters said that they faced fines — harshly — for crossing the white line at traffic signals.
Ashish Verma, who was penalised at a signal, said that his car was ahead of the line because the signal abruptly turned red and he braked, but could not reverse it due to a lack of space. But, despite his explanation and plea, he was penalised Rs 200.
Residents said that the penalties are hitting them hard and that unjustifiable action was not acceptable. They said that their vehicles are stopped at fine recovery posts and forced to pay up.
“I subsist on my meagre pension. At Midhani recovery post, I pleaded to officials that I did not know online payment procedures and asked them to wait till evening, when my children would come home, but my request fell on deaf years,” Haque said.
Haque said he wrote to the Hyderabad police commissioner and the GHMC commissioner, demanding a refund of Rs 1,690 collected in fines, on the grounds that the on-ground police are taking excessive action and threatening to drag citizens to court in petty cases.
