Pune: A professor from a Hadapsar college did not think twice before attacking a woman traffic constable after a dispute broke out between them over wrong-side driving between Noble Hospital and Magarpatta junction around 11.15am on Tuesday. She has been booked.Constable Rani Gawli was controlling the traffic at Magarpatta junction when she spotted an autorickshaw travelling against the flow. She signalled to the driver to stop and sought an explanation from him and then instructed him to take the vehicle to the Hadapsar police station.The professor, who was in the passenger’s seat, grew furious when she heard the conversation and started an argument with the cop. She challenged her authority by saying that she had no business to stop the vehicle.Hadapsar police’s assistant inspector Amol Kale on Wednesday said, “The driver had broken traffic rules. The professor should not have interfered in the traffic police’s action. She picked up a dispute with the constable because she was in a hurry. She then attacked her, damaged her name plate and tore off three buttons from her uniform and created a ruckus on the road.”He said the suspect broke her gold chain and threw it into the autorickshaw and accused the cop of grabbing her jewellery. “She left her bag inside the vehicle and took to her heels. We identified her and decided to act against her as attacking a cop on duty in a serious crime.” She will be arrested and a chargesheet will be filed against her, he added.Assistant inspector Rajendra Magar, in-charge of the Hadapsar traffic police, said, “The driver told the policewoman that he was advised by the passenger to drive on the wrong side as she did so regularly to reach her destination. When the argument began to escalate, he told her stay out of it. He also requested her to get off the vehicle and not pay the fare. He advised her not to pick up a dispute with the traffic policewoman but she did not listen.”Senior inspector Sunil Tambe, in-charge of the Hadapsar police station, told TOI , “The passenger later approached a senior officer to make a false complaint that the policewoman had damaged her chain and misbehaved with her. The driver in his statement to the police has said that the passenger herself damaged her chain and picked up a dispute with the cop.”

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