New Delhi, Aug 5 : With you, For you, always, (with your baby), appears to be Delhi Traffic Police motto.
The crass Delhi Traffic policemen scored a bounty on Saturday, when their vehicle removing crane lifted a locked car from a no-parking zone with a two-year-baby Nandika sleeping inside, and dumped it at Shakarpur police station in Northeast Delhi.
Anil Bedi, 30, and wife Neelu (25) had locked their Santro car and had gone to a medicine shop to buy medicines, keeping their baby Nandika sleeping on the back seat of the car. The baby was sedated because she was unwell.
A Delhi Traffic policeman meanwhile came with a vehicle moving crane on Vikas Marg, and without giving the parents a warning, just got the car lifted, unmindful of a baby inside, and dumped the vehicle in Shakarpur police station.
It was a frantic search for their child, as the parents found their car missing. They rang up 100 (Delhi Police emergency number), who directed them to go to the Shakarpur police station.
At the police station, the parents found their baby still inside the car, but she had fallen off the seat on to the floor, as the car was being towed away.
The Bedis, who live in Preet Vihar in east Delhi, said they were not at fault as Neelu had stepped out of the car "only briefly".
Anil, a builder, had got down to buy medicines but called to his wife to confirm the brand name. Neelu said she rolled down the rear window to keep a watch on the baby and got off.
According to the Bedis, "just five minutes later" when they turned to check, the car was gone. "I learned from a passerby that my car had been towed away," said Anil.
The parents had an explanation for that.
Initially, the mother, Neelu Bedi (25), was sitting in the car when the father, Anil Bedi (30), a builder, stepped out to the buy medicines.
She was called to confirm the name of a medicine and she left after rolling down the windows so that she could keep a watch on the daughter, she said. It was a routine thing for the Bedis, who stay in the Baldev Park area of Preet Vihar, barely a couple of kilometres from the spot.
Interestingly, the glass of the rear window of the car, Santro Zing, had been rolled down but the policeman and the towing van's staff didn't care to look.
The police, which is expected to adopt a humane approach in such matters, is often seen in a hurry to tow away partly because of the money that's paid to the towing contractor. And the zeal to tow away is often quite selective with roadside parking even in congested areas clearly overlooked.
Joint CP (traffic) Satyendra Garg said a high-level inquiry has been ordered into the incident but he had a word of advice for the parents.
"For the good of the child, the parents too need to be careful and vigilant. They cannot leave a child alone, especially when she is unwell and sleeping,'' he said.
