A thought-provoking song by Rohit, a five-year-old boy studying in UKG, drove home the message of road safety at the inaugural of ‘Arrive – Alive’, a road safety awareness campaign launched by the City Police here on Friday.
The five-minute song in Telugu covered various aspects of safety use of zebra crossings by pedestrians, avoiding cell phone while driving and the void created in the lives of parents when they lose their children in accidents. Despite his young age, the boy was clear in his diction and didn’t falter even once while singing the lengthy song.
Port Chairman Ajeya Kallam, who participated as chief guest at the inaugural function, said it was unfortunate that motorists and road users tend to blame the police or the government for accidents instead of adhering to traffic rules and adopting safe driving practices.
Over-speeding
Over-speeding and driving after consumption of alcohol were the common causes of accidents. Citing an example, he said motorists were blaming the authorities for accidents on the Port Connectivity Road, while that road was developed only for the use of heavy cargo vehicles.
Additional Director General Anuradha commended the City Police for bringing down the number of accidents on the roads despite an increase in the number of vehicles. She underlined the need for Traffic Police to treat motorists with respect and abstain from abusing violators as that would tarnish the image of the entire police force.
Ms. Anuradha, reviewed the records of all branches at the Commissionerate, inspected the police sub controls at Ram Nagar and MVP Colony and gave suggestions to serve the public in a better manner like display of toll free phone numbers.
Police Commissioner B. Shivadhar Reddy expressed concern that 60 per cent of those killed in road accidents were pedestrians and two-wheeler riders, he impressed upon motorists on the need to respect the rights of pedestrians.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) P. Viswa Prasad felt that scant respect for the rules was responsible for most road accidents. Road safety should be inculcated among children so that continue to respect road rules as they grow up.
Director (personnel) of Visakhapatnam Steel Plant Y.R. Reddy spoke on the importance of erecting warning boards and barriers when a truck or other vehicle suffers a breakdown on the highway or other important roads.
Deputy Transport Commissioner Md. Saleem impressed upon school children to insist on their parents to wear helmets and obey traffic rules on the road.
District Collector V. Seshadri spoke. Additional DCP (Traffic) Suresh Babu administered the road safety pledge to the gathering. RTC Regional Manager Y. Jagadeesh Babu was present.
