Rich kids in high spirits shatter poor’s dreams
Nov 13th, 2006 by Karthick
Following Salman Khan, Neel Chatterjee, Aliston Pereira with 5 of his friends have come under media’s light for hit and run cases. Last night, Aliston Pereira and his friends, who were in high spirits , shattered the dreams of 20 poor souls sleeping peacefully in the pavement of Bandhra’s Carter road, Mumbai. Six of them were killed and fourteen of them injured. The accused were returning from a five star hotel’s night club and were on their way to a friend’s birthday party. Aliston Pereira, the man behind the wheels, was drunk. When asked about this gory incident, he says that his car lost control due to a mechanical problem and ran into the construction workers. A bottle of liquor was also found in the accused’s car. Pereira and his friends were took into police custody. He is booked for culpable homicide not mounting to murder and others are booked under the Bombay Prohibition Act. Pereira is still under police custody and his friends are released out on bail.
In September 2004, Stephanie was killed on the road by drunken youths. Chennai was shocked by the incident. And since then the police has tightened the security measures a bit more and is a bit harsh on the night clubbers. In a way, it is good as it guarantees a safe environment for people to live. I have seen myself a few of these drunken youths, who race at Marina and Besant beaches in their modified bikes and cars. It is really difficult for the citizens to walk or drive on the roads when these unruly youths go crazy and do all the stunts on roads.
Bike, car stunts in movies and TV ads also inspire young people to try them on roads. Young people fall into the trap that they are super cool
if they are involved in any of these.
A lot of examples include the movie Ghulaam, Rang De Basanti, The recent Apache, Pulsar ads and the list goes on. Not only the media, the parents of these young people are also to be blamed. If they were careful enough in drawing the line of control at certain point, these kind of incidents can be avoided.
One more month, when all the media attention starts to move away from this case, the rich kids will be let out free and they will start clubbing again. The poor as always will hold demonstrations and will go quiet as they cannot stand and fight for their rights.
Where is justice?
Will the rich kids be punished for this gory act?
Will the police tighten up more security and punish drunken drivers?
I have a few suggestions for the police and the people to stop these kind of incidents from happening.
1. On every major road, have check posts and conduct regular checks on people for drunken driving. Especially, near pubs and night clubs, have more people to check. If a person is caught for drunken driving, put him under bars for that whole night and leak the news out to the dailies. This should be done irrespective of the status the person has in the society.
2. A lot people get away by using their high profile contacts when they are caught for drunken driving on the roads. If a person tries to boast his influence by saying Do you know who I am ?
, He should be smacked at least ten times in the back and put under bars. The next time he will dare to think of using it.
3. Close all the pubs and night clubs at 11.00 PM.
4. Canceling of licenses for the joints who serve liquour for minors and are open after the stipulated time. The owners of these joints must be put under bars for at least ten years.
5. Seizing the bikes and cars that are modified or tuned for racing and stunts on road.
6. Curfew for bikes and cars to run after 10.00 PM on New Year’s eve. This way, all the drunkards will shut indoors and gory incidents can be avoided.
In this way, we can build a healthy and safer society. What ya say?
Totally relevant post, in recent times. Good one!
Bangalore has very recently had a couple of similar high-profile rich kids running amok and causing problems for public. One was the chief minister Kumaraswamy’s son Nikhil, and the other – model maker, and socialite Prasad Bidapa’s son Adam Bidapa.
Nikhil and his friends assaulted the staff of a hotel which refused to serve them at 12.00 in the night. They pelted the hotel with stones and broke the glass apart from causing a huge ruckus.
19 yr old Adam was accused of assaulting policemen in a drunken fit, when they raided a pub. While Adam’s incident was publicised quite a bit by the media, Nikhil’s doing was hushed up – the hotel owner’s claimed that nothing of the sort happened (even though the broken glass was there for all to see the next morning), and soon, there were a hundred different stories doing the rounds with Nikhil being portrayed as the bakra, instead of the perpetrator. Kumaraswamy claimed later (in an interview in the Times of India) that his son is an innocent lamb, and that his friends had spoilt him… I only pitied the guys whose mouths had to be sealed in an attempt to rescue the CM’s reputation.
And how can we forget Pramod Mahajan’s son Rahul, who had so much of public sympathy and support when his dad was in hospital, but lost it all and suddenly became the overgrown juvenile delinquent when he was reported to have had a drug overdose, and his high-profile lifestyle was thrown open to public eyes.
I agree that such spoilt kids should definitely be punished for their acts, but the reality is that with enough (political) clout, most of these people go scot free, and it is the general public who get into real trouble. A case in point is the one that is generating all the mass media frenzy – Manu Sharma (who’s allegedly shot Jessica Lal).
There are also some other similar rich-kid cases, where the offence may not have been as much, but the media (who’s has equated news to sensationalism and celebrity gossip) makes it the news of the century.
I guess ultimately, these rich kids are the casualities of the lifestyle they are caught in – heavy pockets, instant fame, no restrictions at home, minimal family contact, pubbing, drugs, drink… And soon, it will not just be the rich kids of the politicians and socialites. Tomorrow, even the kids of the Double income parents – software engineers and the like, will be casualities of the same lifestyle. We’d better watch it.
In ideal situations your solutions could work. In practical, as long as those shops and pubs are directly or indirectly being owned by our law makers or law enforcers, nothing is going to change other than our tolerance level.
Shikha,
Was there at Bangalore yesterday and the day before. Every road has a pub as every road in chennai has a tea shop.
It’s true. Was suprised to see teens wielding their cards in the forum and making lot of fuss. Don’t know where these things are gonna end.
Raj,
Agreed. My tolerance level is increasing day by day. At least, I can show my grudge here through my post.
Your argument doesn’t seem to be fair. You obviously seem to sell the thought that rich fellows are bunch of irresponsible idiots, who often break the law, run their cars over fellows sleeping in the pavement, always drunk etc., – Too rude, shame on you.
First try to see people as people, not as rich or poor. Guilty should be punished no matter their rich or poor. I hope you agree with the fact that over 80% of the crime committed in India are by done by people who are not rich. I see you don’t seem to understand the fact that we in India have weaker laws that help criminals (both rich & poor!Er!!!) can make use of, to get themselves out. Again, it is our justice system at which you should be yelling at.
Do you realize something, you are spending at least 300-600% more than what your father or grandfather was spending. So, it is quite common you see a little fellow using a card in some mall… Don’t envy him swipe the card for a bulky amount, it’s enough grown-ups make sure he is getting the stuff for his age.
“Curfew for bikes and cars to run after 10.00 PM” – You must be ashamed of yourself. Have you got any stats from wherever to justify that accident/crime rates will go down(,on a New year eve,) if you do have this dumbest idea in place?
Drunken driving kills so many people every year, it is a major problem today, but I think it can be addressed in two many ways. Few solutions are: Heavy fines, Imprisonment, life-time cancellation of license etc., – Again you see, we already have these laws/rules, but our government doesn’t care to ensure 100% implementation of these laws. It only needs Rs. 50-100 to bribe and get away.
You seem to hate a class of people who are freaky – Maybe you have got something personal. But, I just want to tell you that not all people going to Pub are punks and not all going to Temple/Church/Mosque are saints. Such lifestyle, that you fear of can co-exist with us as long they create problem to any living being.
Cheers,
Karthick
Hey Karthick,
Welcome here! Be clear that
1. the post is not to compare the percentage of crime committed by the rich and the poor. I agree that a crime is a crime when committed by anyone. But, the rich can get out easily than the poor with the amount of wealth and influence they have.
2. Not targeted on all party goers.
Understand that the post was written on frustration when the rich people or the so-called celebrities commit such shameful acts and escape out easily.
Please go through the dailies for the stats you asked about. Special instructions from the Chennai police was to close down the clubs at a speculated time to prevent rash and drunken driving and any other mishaps. Prevention is better than cure.
In no way, I am jealous of kids swiping cards and I am just afraid about the age they are introduced to these things. It will not help them build a healthy attitude.
I am not saying that all people who party hard or go to clubs are punks. I am targeting the group of people who behave the other way after they get into high spirits and cause problems to others and escape from the law.
Hope you understand if you go through my post again with the substantiating comments it received.