Lucknow, Feb. 10 -- Nearly a decade after the Centre imposed a countrywide total ban on red and blue beacons to eliminate the deep-rooted and much-criticised VIP culture, the same lights have returned fast to the Uttar Pradesh roads, albeit in a new avatar.

Officers across departments as well as many political dignitaries are increasingly using multicoloured red-blue-white lights, in varying shapes and designs, ranging from long bars to small oval and triangular units, as substitutes for the beacons.

Meant strictly and exclusively for notified emergency services, these devices are once again reviving the same sense of entitlement once symbolised by beacons, popularly known as ' laal-neeli batti'.

"Multicoloured lights, permitted only o...