Paying for overspeeding keeping lives at stake

Ludhiana: Overspeeding has again claimed four lives in Ludhiana as an i-20 car fell into Sidhwana Canal near Sarabha Nagar on Friday night killing all four occupants. According to police, the car was going on a speed of 100 kmph. In the CCTV footage with cops, the speeding car has been captured ramming into sides of the bridge before falling into the canal.
Recently, in September 23, 2018, two youngsters died while one sustained injuries when their speeding car rammed into a divider at National Highway-I near Karabara Chowk. In this tragic incident Eklavya Sharma (20) and Ashwani Vij (22) died, while Shubham Bhatt (22) got injured. The trio was returning home after celebrating Eklava’s birthday.

In another incident reported on January 7, 2017, four college students Sanyam Arora (20), Gaurish Verma (21), Rishika Bassi (19), Ishani Jindal (19) were killed, and Akshit Grover (21) suffered injuries. Their overspeeding car rammed into a tree near Issewal village on South City Road. The car was crashed completely and the four died on the spot.

Stretches like Deepak Hospital Road, Phullawal Road, South City Road, Southern Bypass are the spots where maximum overspeeding death cases have been reported.

Road safety expert, Kamaljit Soi, said, “More than 70% accidents happen as a result of overspeeding. In Ludhiana, people have no fear of being caught due to the laxity of law enforcement agencies. Police claims to have a 24x7 patrolling and surveillance system in place, while the reality is completely different.” He added that as far as the recent case is considered, overspeeding and high beams of other vehicles collectively became the reason behind the accident.

Talking about overspeeding, Soi said, “In Ludhiana majority of the cuts and crossings have been closed by traffic police due to which people have to take longer routes to take a turn. People tend to overspeed when they have to take a longer route. The traffic police needs to work on it.”

The additional deputy commissioner of police (traffic) Tarun Rattan, “In day time, we issue challans for overspeeding and drunk driving, and in late evening police patrolling is carried out.” He added that he has asked the ACP to prepare a report on the stretches where maximum overspeeding death cases are reported.