HYDERABAD: The Cyberabad police on Sunday said false information was being spread on social media platforms over the powers of the police to detain or seize vehicles being driven by drunk drivers. In a statement, the Cyberabad police said they indeed had powers to detain such vehicles which could be released only after the due process, as laid down by the law.
The police said false news was being spread that the High Court of Telangana had ordered that the “traffic police have no powers to seize the vehicles for non-payment of challans.” The police said there was no such blanket order and that some persons, for reasons best known to them, were issuing misleading statements in the media and social media creating confusion among the public. Legal action was being considered against those spreading this false information, the police said.
The statement said the High Court, in its order on August 11, this year, disposing a writ petition directed the petitioner to submit a fresh application to the police seeking release of his vehicle as per the law within two weeks from the date of the order and that the police had to consider the same and pass an appropriate order in another eight weeks thereafter. Following this, the Cyberabad police said, the person who had filed the writ petition, on August 19 paid the pending challan against the seized vehicle and got the vehicle released.
“The police can detain a vehicle with pending traffic violation challans that are more than 90 days old about which the vehicle owner has been intimated by the police at least once either electronically or over a call. It is the vehicle owner’s duty to regularly check whether their vehicle is driven in contravention of any traffic rules and if any traffic violation challans have been issued against their vehicles, following which they should pay the penalty. Any discrepancies in the challans can be reported to the authorities online for verification and rectification as needed,” the Cyberabad police said.
