NEW DELHI, May 2: The blinkers are off. The Delhi Police was richer by at least Rs 6 lakh through challans issued till 9 pm on the first day of its drive against solar films and silver reflectors on car windows and windshields.But, not surprisingly, the campaign has its quota of Doubting Thomases, led by Delhi Transport Minister Rajendra Gupta. He said today that he had written to the chief secretary about ``the colossal waste of manpower in enforcing the drive''. ``Police personnel,'' he told The Indian Express, ``should concentrate more on managing the traffic problem. The police did not consult me on the issue even once.'' Delhi Police is under the Union Home Ministry, and this explains Gupta's annoyance.The Traffic Police, however, say that the drive was planned to reduce the accident rate and prevent recurrence of incidents like the one in which a Japanese girl was abducted and allegedly gangraped inside a Maruti car with tinted windows. It would also help to check drinking inside cars.DelhiPolice Commissioner T.R. Kakkar contributed his mite to the drive by having the tint-film on his Contessa's windows peeled off this morning. Other police officials followed suit and by evening, at least the white Ambassadors at the police HQ at ITO had windows that conformed to the new rule.A random survey by the police this morning showed that around 20 per cent of approximately 60,000 owners of Delhi-registered cars, with tinted glasses, had already adopted the latest specifications.Ravi Dudeja was not among those who had done so. His Maruti car, with near opaque tinted windows, was stopped at Minto Bridge around 11.30 a.m.. Dudeja did not complain. He readily paid a fine of Rs 100 to a Traffic Sub-inspector, promising to have his windows changed.For the Khanna family, on the other hand, their offence turned into a spectacle. Their car was stopped on Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg this afternoon. A special traffic team promptly handed out a challan for Rs 100, and then removed the dark solar films fromKhanna's red Maruti car, using a blade and window cleaning detergent.Some 50 passers-by witnessed ``the drive''. And a group of TV journalists happily walked away with their ``clip of the day''.As part of the drive, 50 mobile teams - comprising an officer, a constable and a helper - are checking vehicles across the city. Each of these teams have been supplied with 5 cm x 5 cm samples of tinted glasses which will be used to compare with tinted windshields and windows on cars.Sophisticated instruments like Lux meters or illuminators to measure the percentage of light transmitted through windows are not being used because of the high cost of such equipment.DCP (Traffic) says: ``We had challaned 3,518 vehicles till 4 p.m. and removed solar films from 1,328 vehicles. We can't do anything about tinted windows, but have advised car owners to change them soon. The number of challans will definitely go up later in the evening and in the next few days, as there is no particular time-schedule forconducting the drive.''
