Model officer: police in the Indian city of Bangalore are hoping the dummies will deter traffic offenders (Manjunath KIRAN)
<p>Bangalore (India) (AFP) – Dummy police are the newest recruits to law enforcement in India’s southern city of Bangalore where authorities have adopted an unusual tactic to fight traffic offenders.</p><p>Mannequins dressed up as traffic officers — complete with hats, white shirts and fluorescent vests with police insignia — are being placed at major intersections in the hope they will prompt drivers to observe the rules.</p><p>Some even wear sunglasses and face masks.</p><p>With eight million cars plying the notoriously busy roads in a tech hub renowned for its traffic snarls, police say they don’t have enough flesh and blood officers to man all the junctions.</p><p>"The idea is not to scare anybody, the idea is to increase the compliance," city police commissioner Bhaskar Rao told AFP.</p><p>"There are 44,000 junctions in the city but traffic lights are fixed in (only) about 450 junctions, the rest of it is manned manually or not managed at all."</p><p>He added that officers use a "hide and seek" tactic — swapping the mannequins with actual police — to keep drivers on their best behaviour.</p><p>Bangalore, dubbed as the Silicon Valley of India, is home to an estimated 13 million people.</p><p>An average of two people die every day on the roads of the megalopolis with 4,283 crashes reported from January to November this year, many blamed on drink-driving, speeding and drivers ignoring traffic signals.</p><p>There were 50,457 cases of reckless driving and another 57,394 for drink-driving this year, official figures show.</p><p>The model officers have received a mixed reaction from commuters about whether the dummy ploy would work, with some locals praising police for thinking outside the box.</p><p>"It’s a general human mentality that when you see a policeman, you have fear in your heart, ‘Oh I am doing something wrong, I will not do it’," said clothing company director Vijay Shekhar.</p><p>Others were more sceptical.</p><p>Businessman Rohit Kamalkar said the scheme wouldn’t work in a country like India where rules are flouted with impunity.</p><p>"We do not follow rules even when they (police) are real (so) how would it work when they are not moving and running after us?," tech consultant Sapan Agarwal added.</p><p></p>

Disclaimer: Validity of the above story is for 7 Days from original date of publishing. Source: AFP.