Mumbai RTO seeks ban on biking movies

'Films like Dhoom influence youth and encourage activities like bike racing and rash driving', says state's transport chief SD Shinde, reports Rajendra Aklekar.

No Dhoom-1 and no Dhoom-2 if the Maharashtra's Transport commissioner has his way. Blaming bike racing and rash driving scenes in Hindi movies, state transport commissioner is planning to shoot a letter to the censor board of India and such scenes be deleted from movies as they influence youth, encourage bike racing and lead to more accidents.

HT Image

"Films like Dhoom  influence youth and encourage activities like bike racing and rash driving. Most of the youth who are immature to handle powerful vehicles simply imitate such films and end up in accidents. Hence, I have written a letter to the Censor Board of India to delete such scenes from movies as Hindi films influence one and all and seventy per cent of two-wheeler accidents occur due to high speed," state's transport chief Shyamsunder D Shinde told HT on the occasion of Road Safety Week organised between January 1 and 8.

Maharashtra tops accident statistics in India with the number of accidents in the state has gone up from 65,686 in 2003 to 67,720 in 2005 and in urban areas like Mumbai, two-wheelers are the main culprit. Mumbai traffic police statistics state that while the number of offences by two-wheeler riders has doubled since 2003, the number of two-wheeler accidents since then has more than trebled.

"Two-wheeler riders are crazy lane-cutters. They not only break rules by cutting lanes and overtaking, but also scare the motorists who tend to lose control of their vehicle when such a rider suddenly comes in front of the car. Let's compare cities like Mumbai and Pune, for example. Pune has always been a two-wheeler city. It has had a history of cycles, mopeds and later bikes. But there's an important point to remember that there's comparatively lesser density of vehicles on roads and even less traffic. In Mumbai, people are forced to take to bikes because there's lack of sustainable public transport," a senior traffic department official said.
 
Total number of bikes: 3,65,261
Total number of scooters: 2,49,672
Total number of mopeds: 32,959
Total number of cycles: No count

Two-wheeler accidents registered in 2003: 3,498
Motorcycles: 2,626
Scooters: 642
Cycles: 230

Two-wheeler accidents registered in 2004: 4,829
Motorcycles: 3,307
Scooters: 1,401
Cycles: 121

Two-wheeler accidents registered in 2005: 4,789
Motorcycles: 3,366
Scooters: 1,416
Cycles: 7

Two-wheeler accidents registered in 2006: 1,285 (till April)
Motorcycles: 1,020
Scooters: 250
Cycles: 15

Offences registered against two-wheelers
2003: 2,76,805
2004: 4,20,281
2005: 5,55,947