In view of the impending foggy season, Haryana Police have mooted a plan to roll out a special campaign to give vital tips to road users about safe driving for avoiding road mishaps due to fog when visibility is negligible.
Under the drive, the police officials will not only organise various awareness programmes in their area concerned to make road-users aware about driving in foggy conditions but also ask them to fix radium tapes and reflectors on their vehicles besides using fog lights to avert road accidents.
A communiqué in this regard has recently been shot off to all Superintendents of Police (SPs) of the four districts — Rohtak, Jhajjar, Sonepat and Panipat — which fall under the jurisdiction of Rohtak Range by the office of the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Rohtak.
The SPs have been directed to hold special programmes for truck and bus drivers, besides others, to make them aware about preventive measures to be taken while driving in foggy conditions. They have also been asked to dispatch a comprehensive report about the campaign to the IGP office so as to review the situation accordingly.
“There is an urgent need to provide vital tips regarding safe driving in the foggy season as most of the road mishaps occur due to over speeding besides negligence by drivers in adopting precautionary measures to cope with foggy conditions,” said Anil Rao, IGP of Rohtak Range, while talking to The Pioneer here.
He maintained most of the accidents can be averted with the drivers compliance with traffic rules and regulations. During the fog, the drivers should not drive their vehicles at a high speed and must keep parking indicators on if they park their vehicles alongside the road for some purpose so that other drivers may also see the vehicle from a distance.
“Drivers of trucks and tractor-trolleys use to park their vehicles along the roadside, particularly outside the dhabas. Most of these tractor-trailers and trucks do not even have proper reflectors, leading to road accidents,” said Rao, adding that the police chiefs had been directed to challan the vehicles found parked on the road.
The IGP maintained social and voluntary organisations would also be roped in to coordinate with the traffic police for carrying out the drive successfully.