Past midnight, traffic flows down Marine Drive as fast as the liquor in the watering holes that dot it. And with the flow comes a rash of drunken driving.Two weeks ago, a red Ford Ikon drove itself into a mangled mess down Marine Drive and was dumped along Chowpatty beach. On Saturday morning, a deep blue Ford repeated the feat. Twenty-eight-year old Vijay Kishore Mohnani, 28, drove into Javed Habib Sheikh, 18, and killed the Sheikh family’s only breadwinner.Mohnani added one more case of rash driving to the police records. Javed was hit by the speeding Ford, rushing from the Churchgate end, around 2 a.m. He died on the spot, said Senior Inspector Subash Salvi.As the police were taking stock, two speeding cars dashed into their nearby stationary vehicle. Two policemen were slightly hurt, said Inspector Vishnu Deokar. Mohnani was charged under IPC Section 304 for rash driving resulting in accident.In early April, 17-year-old NRI Urvashi Ramakrishnan, in Mumbai on a holiday, died in a crash on Marine Drive. Like the Mohnani’s accident, this too happened early in the morning. Ramakrishnan’s car, with three others inside, ran into a tourist bus.‘‘In the last four months, there has been four to five deaths on this stretch because of drunken or rash driving,’’ ACP Suresh Jadhav said. ‘‘It turns into a dangerous road after 9 p.m.’’ The pubs and watering holes dotting the road turn the stretch into a high-risk zone, both for drivers and pedestrians, he said.For DCP (Traffic) Himanshu Roy, Marine Drive and the Haji Ali stretch are the most common accident-and-death sites, mainly triggered by drunken driving. ‘‘Oh, the prosecutions are many,’’ he said when quizzed about speed radar guns and the 60 km/hr speed limits. ‘‘We conduct regular drives along these stretches and fine errant drivers,’’ he said.For the well heeled, however, Rs 1,000 is no deterrent. Under IPC Section 279, rash and negligent driving invites a fine of Rs 1,000. Roy said: ‘‘The traffic police will stock up on alcohol breath analysers and speed radar guns in two months under a modernisation programme. Arrests should increase after that.’’According to police sources, on an average Marine Drive reports eight minor and major accidents every month. Though there are road safety programmes for about 45,000 school students, innovative hoardings urging riders to wear helmets and check speed, and policemen who haul up speedsters, under cover of night everything is forgotten on Marine Drive.
