[Emvi]

Today my car was stopped by the highway patrol cops on the Madikeri-Mysore highway about 2-3 Kms from Madikeri while I was returning from Mysore. I absolutely had no idea, why I was stopped. After stopping, on enquiry, I was asked to present the vehicle documents to the Inspector seated inside the highway patrol vehicle. And when I met the inspector, he did not bother to check the documents, he just said that I was overspeeding.

I was shocked further and asked him to show me the proof that I was overspeeding. He promptly showed me the monitor connected to speed gun, which had recorded my speed and it was 60 kmph! I just did not know how to react. I confronted the cop and questioned him, how on earth could a speed of 60kmph on a highway be considered as overspeeding!? He said the speed limit on that particular stretch is actually 40 kmph and even though I am not overspeeding in actual terms, it is technically overspeeding and I am liable to pay a fine of 1000 bucks for the offence! C'mon. He said there are speed limit boards beside the highway, which I am not sure. I have never seen/noticed such boards all these years.

One thing that did not irritate me further was the politeness of the cops. The cops never used the infamous "police language" during the entire duration of the event. Only thing the inspector agreed upon was to cut down the fine, how? It's interesting. He said he will fine me just 500 bucks instead of 1000 for not wearing the seatbelt. I was definitely wearing the seatbelt and when I told him so, he coolly said he knew it, but that's the only way he can reduce the fine! I just have no words for this kind of atrocity. Since I did not wanted to pay for the offence that I did not commit, I objected his offer and told him that I am willing to pay the fine of 1000 bucks with a condition that I should be given the receipt and the proof of overspeeding. He agreed only after my persuasion.





I have two questions,
1. Is the speed limit of 40kmph on highways a valid one?
2. Are deviations to the prescribed speed limits allowed in the rulebook? If yes, by how much?
3. How can I escalate this matter to the higher authorities, if you think I have a case here?

Your feedback BHPians..
Thanks in advance.

[YD14]

Originally Posted by Emvi

1. Is the speed limit of 40kmph on highways a valid one?
...
3. How can I escalate this matter to the higher authorities, if you think I have a case here?

If the speed limit is indeed 40kmph officially, then nothing can be done about that. The authorities can always come up explanations like high number of accidents to set such a crawling speed limit. But, what can be challenged is that there was no sign indicating the speed limit or the sign was not prominent enough. For that you can e-mail NHAI. They have responded to complaints about bad highway designs in the past.

As far as my knowledge goes, getting them to increase the speed limit is next to impossible.

A question I have, if the speed limit was indeed 40kmph on a highway, then many people would have been exceeding it. Did they stop everyone on the highway?

[SS80]

I think the cops usually target vehicles from far off cities, even if they are registered in the same state.
I used to own a Nano that had KA45 Reg plates and often Bangalore cops would stop me instead of so many other cars, even for simple documents checking.

About speed limit warning, although it's impossible to drive any modern car at 40kmph in top gear, the speed limits might be decided considering many factors like - nearest wildlife zone, width of road, accident frequency, street light availability, intersections etc.

You cannot challenge the cops about board not being visible, they will never park an interceptor if there is no actual speed limit board on that road.

At times such silly and outdated speed limits do eat up into our wallet.

[Aney Kadam]

This pic of my car was clicked by the police when I was on the downward slope of the bridge. The police ertiga was parked on the side of the road it was kind of hidden. I saw the car and thought the limit is 80kph on the whole highway but they have changed the speed limits on the bridges, apparently, it's 50kph on the bridges and 80kph on the normal road.
In the following days, I did try to go below 50kph and drove on the left-most lane but I was being yelled at by bikers, truckers, and other car drivers for going soo slow
it's even worse on Mumbai eastern express highway(sion to Mulund). its 80kph on the normal road and 40kph on the bridge. is it even safe to brake from 80kph to 40kph just for the bridge I mean won't it be dangerous to speed down drastically in fast-moving traffic?

[Hayek]

Frankly speed limits on loads of Indian roads are a joke. I am generally law abiding and do not believe in driving at very high speeds - but following some of the speed limits such as 30 kph on the JJ flyover, 50 kph in parts of the Sea Link and the random variations between 40, 50, 70 and 80 kph on other flyovers in Bombay is impossible and arguably more dangerous than “speeding” along with the traffic. I do try and slow down in areas where known speed cameras are located (as do most other regular road users - so slowing down is not necessarily dangerous), but have taken a call that paying some speed fines is part of the cost of driving on Indian roads.

[Axe77]

+1 to Hayek there. I often use JJ very early in the morning and its literally ridiculous to be driving at sub 30 kmph on that flyover. And to Aney Kadam’s point, indeed it feels ridiculous to slow down dramatically for such ridiculous variations.

The fact of the matter is there are a lot of other hazards that are more dangerous on our roads, many which are contributed to by the State, but unfortunately its these that are easy pickings to make money and have little to do with anyone’s safety as such.

Just one more cost and annoyance of choosing to live in this country.

[gkveda]

If they have given the receipt and say that speed limit is 40 kmph on that stretch, they will have enough proofs to prove them right. You can not fight and win with them on rules.

If they have offered you to reduce penalty officially by giving receipt for not wearing seat belts, then they were doing it at good will.

They are constrained to reach their targets set by Government. Hence the blame has to be on Government rather than these folks who are just doing their duty.

[Emvi]

Originally Posted by YD14

A question I have, if the speed limit was indeed 40kmph on a highway, then many people would have been exceeding it. Did they stop everyone on the highway?

Yes, two other cars were stopped during that time. However, a speeding truck was allowed to go without being stopped. Maybe the cop got scared to come in its way and wave his hands

[DicKy]

Revenue generation.

That's it.

Please don't give the bull about safety. The way speed signs are peppered along a small stretch of road, I wonder how those high end cars that read road signs and adjust speed would do on our roads. Neck jerking passengers and rear enders?

Almost as if an engineer in a crawling Bolero was given some minimum quota for road signs to be used.
On the straights that are designed for speeds of 120km/h,
"Well, this is supposed to be a highway. Let's put the 80km/h sign here "
A slight curve coming up,
"let's put the 50km/h sign here" (even if an Eeco can take that curve at 80km/h safely).
Some other factor, '30km/h sign', and then when he remembers it is a highway, a token '80km/h sign' soon after.
All this would be in a 1km stretch.

Fact is they know it would be absurd for the natural flow of traffic. Hence we can see everyone driving at 70-90km/h in the stretch safely. But when the targets come from higher ups, they just park by the side and catch some unlucky motorists.

If safety was their concern, everyone doing above 40km/h would have been caught with a fixed camera. Nope, that won't do.

These are just speed traps and not just in India, read somewhere that entire villages in USA have their monthly budget based on the speed fines issued.

[arun_josie]

Originally Posted by Emvi

1. Is the speed limit of 40kmph on highways a valid one?

There are even 20Kmph and 30Kmph zones. The speed limit for the last 1Km before a toll is 20Kmph, at some tolls you can see this 20Kmph board.

As mentioned by few already, it is not possible to stick to the actual speed limits on indian roads for various reason. Someone can maintain 80Kmph limit but you maybe still speeding on a 20-30-40Kmph zone.

[Raghu M]

Sorry about the incident. But if the official speed limit of that road was set at 40 kmph, there is nothing you can do. While speed limits are not set properly on Indian roads, the cops play their hand here. Although the cop quoted the speed limit, they pretty well knew that the empty road would encourage drivers to speed. Nothing much can be done about it, pay and move on.

[V.Narayan]

To take a leaf out of Hayek's advice - to drive a car in India you have various costs - taxes, fuel costs, maintenance, residential parking fees and "police costs". The speed limits set in some States & cities are done so with little thought to real safety and smooth flow of traffic and a lot of thought to improving State revenues with some jam on the side for the hard working cops. So just treat it as a cost of driving in India, don't let your feelings get too hurt or your ego get too pinched and move on.

[TrackDay]

Unfortunately one cant reason out of this one. If the Highway authority has set a speed limit in a certain section, then it has to be followed

This is common widely abroad and is going to come across into our road system too. Here is an old post from a Bhp-ian who received a fine for a certain section of the road in NZ.
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/route...ml#post3526191 (Got a speeding ticket from New Zealand)

Another recent one From Kolkata
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/shift...ml#post5031381 (Speed Guns in Kolkata to Check Speeding)

My most recent car purchase in India is a Honda City (5th Gen) which comes with connected tech. Since I am abroad most of the time, I had registered the Primary App in my mother's Phone number on her cell. A day or two into ownership, after a highway trip when I returned home I was bombarded at home by my family members as to why I was over speeding. I was definitely sure I hadn't taken it above 60 since it is a new car. Turns out the App was sending notification to my mother's phone how I was violating speed limits. Seems there are data online about what speeds each road is designated. Doing 40 on a 30 speed limit road is still at the end of the day legally wrong and is notified as over speeding. Most of the time we are not informed about these due to our road conditions and distractions. In the future with connected car tech, and that linked with the Government database, Cops don't have to be on the road anymore. Computers will generate plenty of fines based on your cars data.

I think Google maps has this feature nowadays where one can be alerted of local speeds. Better get used to this.
https://www.maketecheasier.com/show-...t-google-maps/

As to the issue of whether the designated speed limits are correct scientifically or not, is the topic of another discussion:
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/road-...ed-limits.html (All about speeding, speed limits, and reasons & methods for setting speed limits)

[am1m]

Some traffic stops are manned by policemen just trying their luck. We were stopped just around Hubli last month for 'overspeeding'. They were clearly expecting a bunch of tourists who would just pay up and carry on. Didn't expect two of us to get down, walk up to the inspector in the police vehicle, show all our documents and politely ask for the camera evidence. They poor cop manning the camera tried his best, kept us waiting, scrolled through the pics, finally settled on one, a new, white SUV and proclaimed, "here this is the picture!"...but alas, unfortunately for him, we were in a battered red Bolero!

Went away without paying anything and saying loud enough for them to hear "harassment, police harassment"

And it's not like they were really busy or anything, they were just waiting on a stretch of road trying to make money off the holiday crowd. Appreciate that cops have an important job and often hard time, but this sort of thing is also very common and contributes to their bad rep.

[Jaguar]

Originally Posted by Emvi

I have two questions,
1. Is the speed limit of 40kmph on highways a valid one?
2. Are deviations to the prescribed speed limits allowed in the rulebook? If yes, by how much?
3. How can I escalate this matter to the higher authorities, if you think I have a case here?

I see three questions

Not only you can't do anything, but you would also be lucky if the ordeal is over. I was caught similarly when entering Goa, on a highway section with ridiculously low-speed limits. Paid the fine, got a receipt and moved on. Nearly two years later, I got a show-cause notice from KL RTO, my license is from KL, stating I had committed some offense in Goa on so and so date. Luckily I had the receipt to match the date and wrote to them saying that I had already paid the fine. Since this was in the middle of covid before travel was open, I requested that I couldn't personally travel to Kerala and appear in front of the RTO. I haven't heard back anything and can only hope the matter is over.