With an aim to control road mishap fatalities, the State Government launched a one-month special enforcement drive across the State on February 1.
Commerce and Transport Principal Secretary Bishnupada Sethi has recently written a letter to all Collectors, Superintendents of Police, Deputy Commissioners of Police, and Regional Transport Officers (RTOs) in this regard.
It is observed that over the last couple of months, road accidents and fatalities have increased exponentially throughout the State. It was the mandate of the Supreme Court Committee on Road Safety to reduce road accident fatalities by 10% every year. But the fatalities have increased by more than 12% from January to October, 2021 compared to the corresponding period of last year, Sethi said.
“Road accidents and fatalities are normally very high from December to February due to heavy fog, picnic season etc. Hence, this period is of utmost importance from the point of view of road safety,” he pointed out.
In this context, it has been decided to conduct the special enforcement drive for one month from February 1 to February 28, 2022 throughout the State by the RTO and police with the objective to detect traffic rule violations and thereby reducing accidents and fatalities.
The district administrations have been instructed to form Joint Enforcement Squads in the district for enforcement against traffic rule violators. During the special drive, enforcement would be conducted during night hours also, he said.
The officials were asked not to park their vehicles on highways during night hours to avoid hit from back category of accidents. The RTOs have been directed to submit a weekly enforcement report to the Transport Commissioner.
Except for six districts (Puri, Nayagarh, Koraput, Deogarh, Kendrapada and Subarnapur), there is an increase in fatalities in all other districts.
From January to October of 2021, a total of 8,922 road mishaps were reported, in which 4,074 persons were killed and 8,087 were critically injured. In the same period of 2020, 7,619 road accident cases were reported in which 3,637 were killed and 6,977 injured, revealed the data.