MUMBAI, January 29: A lone policeman tugging on a rope is laughably incapable of restraining a thousand pedestrians surging behind at a busy intersection. A familiar scenario in Mumbai only reflects how sheer numbers are gradually overwhelming a host of well-intentioned laws regulating everything from `committing public nuisance' to jaywalking and trespassing on railway tracks.For instance, do you know you could be put behind bars for a maximum of six months or fined Rs 1,000 for sauntering across the track to catch the train on the next platform? Section 147 of The Indian Railways Act last updated in 1989 provides for this punishment. Technically, that is.``We make out thousands of such cases annually, but we can't afford to post a policeman at every platform,'' says SP K Ramachandran of the Government Railway Police (GRP). ``Besides, our priority is crime on the railways and problems like men entering ladies compartments.''Central Railway spokesperson Mukul Marwah echoes this feeling. ``It's notonly mid-section but even platforms and slums. With the sheer number of people trespassing everywhere.'' Marwah says there are at least three or four cases of trespassers being run over every day, delaying local services.He directly attributes the increase in trespassing to the proliferation of slums on railway tracks and the population growth in the Metropolis.The railways, who only occasionally undertake drives to nab trespassers, have now settled on advertising campaigns to get the message across. Ironically, it's the scarcely used Section 147 that's being highlighted for deterrent effect.GRP officials say the last straw is when the courts are lenient with trespassing cases, advising the police not to prosecute offenders for such a minor offence.But among the most concerted drives being undertaken to enforce what might be laughed away as frivolous offences, has been undertaken by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).Over a year ago, the BMC awoke to the scarcely invoked Section 115 (e)of the Bombay Police Act, 1950, to beef up its cleanliness drive. This section empowers the municipal corporation to prosecute offenders who spit or throw garbage for creating a nuisance in public places.Unlike railway police, the BMC is content collecting spot fines which are grudgingly coughed up by offenders. The BMC's nuisance detection wing which employs over 100 staffers in 33 `gangs' all over the city, does the dirty work.Anti-spitting drives are conducted every Friday, with a quota of a minimum 30 cases per staffer. Last Friday, 950 spitting cases yielded the corporation Rs 29,980. BMC officials are quick to add that the drive isn't about money. ``The idea is to create an awareness among people about this disgusting habit,'' says Chief Engineer RP Chitravanshi of the Solid Waste Management Cell.But dreaming of Singapore in Mumbai's context is futile, and corporation officials concede they're up against a sea of humanity. ``There's a floating population of some 20 lakh people who commuteevery day, even fixing a quota of 1,000 cases per staffer wouldn't have the desired effect.''Elderly traffic policemen nostalgically recall the days of well-regulated, orderly traffic in the city. Pedestrians sprinting across roads were rounded up in large black vans parked at strategic junctions and slapped with a fine under Section 102 of the Bombay Police Act or produced before the magistrate. Well, three decades later, the scenario has been radically altered. Hordes of pedestrians race through traffic, befuddling policemen and traumatising motorists.Enforcement of Section 102, which fines pedestrians for obstructing traffic, has petered out to half-hearted drives conducted during road safety week even as policemen turn their sights on prosecuting motorists, who're fewer in number.
