Superintendent of Police Vikrant Patil on Monday launched the 30th Road Safety Week celebrations here, and urged students and youth to strictly follow road safety norms, besides taking up active participation in awareness campaigns.
After flagging off an impressive rally with students and police personnel at Gandhi Bomma Circle, the SP joined the procession up to Nagaiah Kalakshetram, where he addressed a public meeting.
Mr. Vikrant Patil said that road accidents resulting in deaths and permanent disabilities to people were ruining the happiness of many families and chances of their decent economic survival. “I urge each and every road user to follow traffic norms, which in turn will usher in a healthy and responsible society,” he said.
Awareness programmes
The SP said that compared to the previous years, the incidence of road accidents and casualties was brought down by 15% and cases of the injured by 22%. “We have deployed 18 road safety campaign vehicles on all national and State highways, covering 64 black spots. The ill-fated vehicles were used for setting up dioramas depicting the evils of road accidents on accident-prone stretches. Every month, 12,540 policemen are working 1.62 lakh hours to spread road safety awareness. Students of 171 colleges have been drafted as road safety ambassadors. About 5,000 community police officers are also working for road safety. More than two lakh people were made to sign the oath forms for road safety and two lakh pamphlets were circulated,” Mr Patil said.
The SP appealed to the public to widely use the ‘Prana Raksha App’ of the Chittoor police which was recently inaugurated by Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu at Kuppam.
Collector P.S. Pradyumna said handling of motor vehicles by minors and unlicensed users, drink and drive, over-speeding and use of unfit vehicles should be strictly avoided.
Additional SPs E. Supraja (Administration), Krishnarjuna Rao (Operations) District Crime Records Bureau in charge M. Maheshwar, District Transport Officer Ch. Pratap, Chittoor MLA D.A. Satyaprabha, Chittoor Mayor Katari Hemalatha and senior police personnel and members of voluntary organisations were present.
‘Onus on all road users’
Kurnool Staff Reporter adds:
Various auto association members, vehicle owners, bike dealers and district officials participated in the road safety event in Kurnool.
Addressing the participants, SP K.Pakirappa said compared to 2017, accidents in 2018 had come down substantially.
Joint Collector Pattanshetty Ravi said everyone must behave responsibly on the roads. Pedestrians, motorcyclists and drivers must follow traffic rules to avoid risks.
