Drunk bizmen on roads

Compared to last year the number of drunk women drivers have increased. Among the 11,825 drunk drivers there were several students, doctors, advocates, journalists, government employees and even ex-servicemen.

Hyderabad Traffic police officials said that six celebrities were also caught in this year's drive against drunk driving conducted in different parts of the city.

“Banjara Hills police caught actors like Nikhil, Raja Ravindra and film director and writer Kona Venkat, while the Jubilee Hills police booked actor Navadeep and writer B.V. Subramanyam for driving after getting intoxicated. Abid traffic police caught Prashanth Singh,” said a police official.

The police record stated that while 12 drunk women drivers were caught last year, 13 women were booked for drunk driving this year. Police seized the vehicles of all the drunk drivers and produced them before courts, where their penalty is decided.

“Most people are given penalty of around Rs 1000. Some were given imprisonment by the magistrate. Over 700 people were sent to jail for different durations of up to one week this year,” said a traffic cop.

There are corruption allegations against the traffic cops conducting drunk driving drives and a team of the Begumpet traffic police was caught red handed by the anti corruption bureau. But senior traffic cops said that strict measures have been initiated to curb corruption in the department.

“We generally do not spare any drunk driver no matter how influential they are and how famous they are,” said a senior cop.