NIGHT LIFE IN BRIBE BOROUGH: Spot: Sealdah. Time: 11 pm on Monday. A traffic policeman stops a truck and seeks to have his palm greased. Picture by Sanjoy Chattopadhyaya

An overladen truck hit a milkman?s bicycle near the Gopalnagar crossing, on Judges Court Road, last February. After noticing the cyclist, the truck driver slammed the brakes. But the vehicle did not stop. It came to a halt only after crushing the middle-aged man under its wheels.

This accident may not have happened had the truck not been overloaded well beyond the permitted capacity. But policemen, who are supposed to stop such trucks, more often than not, do not do so. That is, if the truck drivers are willing to bribe them ? however small the amount may be.

?I have given clear examples of how overloaded trucks enter the city without any policemen stopping them. On the pretext of checking vehicles, they take bribes and allow them free access,? says environmentalist Subhas Dutta.

He had filed a public interest litigation (PIL) in Calcutta High Court on February 28, describing how overloaded trucks contribute to traffic snarls and how little policemen on duty do to stop them.

Dutta is hopeful that once the PIL is heard, some action will be taken. ?We have taken photographs and submitted them in court. Most vehicles get free entry into the city, courtesy the policemen on duty at night,? he stressed.

Statistics available with the traffic department speak for themselves on how many Calcuttans are killed at night, crushed by unknown vehicles.

On an annual average, an ?unknown heavy vehicle? is responsible for 150 deaths at night. Tyre marks at the accident sites show the drivers had tried to stop the vehicles. Even if the brakes were applied, a person could be killed by the vehicle?s momentum.

In 2001 and 2002, unknown vehicles claimed 119 and 145 lives, respectively, while the traffic department recorded the death of 144 people in 2003.

?Trucks have brakes that function under air pressure. Owing to overloading, though the wheels stop rolling, the vehicle?s momentum carries it forward, crushing to death whoever is in front,? said a senior officer with the traffic police?s fatal squad.

In 2003, 61 people were killed after being hit by trucks. Figures available with the traffic department show that 59 people were run over by goods vehicles in 2002, and 61 in 2001. At least 55 persons died in 2004, most of them under overloaded trucks.

Traffic officers confessed that they hardly ask a driver to produce the chalaan to cross-check the quantity of goods loaded in the truck.

Arun Kumar Sharma, deputy commissioner of police (traffic) said he has asked his officers to strengthen the vigil on such vehicles.

Apart from this, senior officers will keep a close eye on the traffic police on roads, just in case they are taking a bribe, Sharma added.