Road rage: Use of arms a cause for concern in Punjab

[Asija, Navdeep]

Road rage: Use of arms a cause for concern

Vibhor Mohan, Times of India, 23 Feb 2016





Punjabis' love for guns is legendary, facto red perhaps by Punjab being a border state. Even many po pular Punjabi songs -Inder jit Nikku's “Desi Gun“, Jim my Wraich's “Loaded Gun“ and Raja Lalka's “Pistol“ -re volve around guns.

So, despite being merely 2.3% of the country's popula tion, the state has nearly 20% of the total private licensed weapons in the country . This often results in incidents o road rage taking a violen turn.

Red-flagging the skewed firearm licensing in the state Punjab's traffic adviser Navdeep Asija has pointed in his advisory note to the state government last week that 4.5 lakh arm licences have been issued to civilians in Punjab allowing them three firearms on a single licence. Therefore, it can be estimated that there are around 11 lakh firearms against 77,000-odd police personnel in the state. Even if there is one firearm per cop, the state police have just 7% of the total private licenced firearms in Punjab. Nearly 21 lakh private arms licences have been issued in India.

The advisory note has been placed on record of the Punjab and Haryana high court as part of an ongoing case on the traffic scenario to seek a ceiling on the number of private licences issued in the state.

Eleven of Punjab's 22 districts figured in the list of the top 50 districts in India with the maximum arms licences.These include Amritsar, Tarn Taran, Ferozepur, Hoshiarpur, Sangrur and Muktsar. In 2014, Punjab was among the top five states reporting the highest number of accidental deaths due to firearms.As many as 24 people were killed, majority of them in instances of road rage. Arms licences are usually sought for protection against the threat to life and property but firearms are being branded as a symbol of power and status in public spaces,“ it reads.

“Increasing number of vehicles, shrinking road space and stressful lifestyle are fuelling anger on the roads. In a few incidents reported in the last couple of years, personal firearms were used, which is a matter of serious concern,“ it adds.

The border district of Gurdaspur, besides Bathinda and Ludhiana top the state with 36,294, 36,232 and 26,756 licences, respectively . Apart from landlords, politicians, property dealers and officers own weapons. Punjab is at the third spot, next only to Uttar Pradesh (11.17 lakh licences) and Madhya Pradesh (2.75 lakh). “Neighbouring Rajasthan (1.67 lakh) and Haryana (1.12 lakh) have issued much lesser number of arms licences,“ said Asija.