Using the age-old reasoning of making the punishment fit the crime, police in a sprawling Chinese metropolis are making drivers who inappropriately flash their bright lights suffer the same agony.

In a post on their micro blog, traffic police in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, said violators were being made to look at bright headlights for five minutes.

The post described it as an "appropriate experience" that would make offenders "sense the harm" such use of their headlights could cause.