Residents of Bhopal observed Raahgiri Day organised by Bhopal City link limited and Bhopal Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Sunday in collaboration with an organisation called EMBARQ to promote the use of non-motorised vehicles, public vehicles and make people aware of road safety measures and healthy living.
Devendra Tiwari, working as an engineer in BMC said, “The Raahgiri concept has been brought to Bhopal after having successfully run in Gurgaon for the past one-and-half years, so that we can make people aware about road safety, healthy lifestyle, use of non-motorised vehicles, public vehicles, etc. and we’ll try to spread it in the entire city. Maximum deaths happen due to road accidents and heart attacks, so we want to send message to be safe on road and stay healthy.”
The event started at 6 am and got a very good response from the people. According to Tiwari, at least 7,000-8,000 people came for the event making him hopeful that Raahgiri Day will soon be celebrated in the entire city.Police inspector Mahendra Kumar Jain also participated in the event by riding a bicycle which was one of the major activities being promoted, besides skating, dance and aerobics.
People of all age groups were seen enjoying the event and a senior participant Rajendra Prasad expressed his excitement by saying that cycles have been arranged for kids and ID cards are also being made for people so that they don’t face any problem.
“On this day many events have been organised here like cycling, football, hockey, aerobics, dance, etc, so that Bhopal becomes healthier as it’s a car free day. Apart from this, there are many exercises also that are being done here to burn calories so that Bhopal can become a healthy city. Basically people are walking here near the lake so it has become a very nice event as you feel really good after coming here early in the morning,” said a participant Mudra Keswani.
Another participant pressed upon the need for such events to be organized regularly in Bhopal as people there had actively participated in the event.