Well, well, well. So the Chai-Paani cadres have successfully subdued the Single Malt Set. I refer, of course, to the Mumbai Police and its cause celebre: the Campaign against Drunk Driving that has done the unthinkable, sobered our boisterous city and turned our Men in Khakhi into Knights in Shining Armour.

We have Alistair Perreira to thank, I guess — remember the surly, sloshed brat who mowed down six sleeping pavement dwellers back in November 2006? (Sure we do, even if we don’t quite recall the victims, or ask why the government still allows half a million vulnerable people to sleep on our streets.)

You may also remember that a sessions court sentenced Perreira to six months in prison, but a division bench of the Bombay high court increased the sentence to three years — after severely indicting the police for botching the evidence. Now the court’s observations obviously touched a nerve that no one dreamt our sensitive cops possessed.

The result: 12,528 cases of drunk driving registered in just six months, 2,623 jailed, 2,739 licences suspended, Rs 2.5 crore collected as fines. Last week, on Christmas Day, six people were sent to prison for one month, another three for a fortnight and 50 between one and five days. And New Year’s Eve contributed a record 338 offenders.

Needless to say, every scalp under the belt has been a feather in the constabulary cap. It’s easy to see why. Firstly, because this campaign reaffirms that debauchery never pays, a lesson that warms the cockles of Mumbai’s puritan heart. Besides, the most liberated party animal cannot deny that it is time we curbed our excesses. Even the sceptics have been silenced, and fatal accidents are down by 22 per cent.

... contd.