Govt for strict traffic law enforcement drives in rural areas

Bhubaneswar: Observing that traffic-related enforcements remain largely confined in urban areas, the state government has asked police and regional transport officers (RTOs) to launch similar crackdowns in rural areas as well.
“Compliance of traffic rules has improved in urban areas due to sustained awareness and enforcement drives. But people in rural areas are not obeying them. Therefore, enforcement should be intensified in both urban and rural areas,” read the minutes of a meeting on road safety, presided by chief secretary Suresh Mahapatra, here recently.
According to the statistics, compiled by the ministry of road transport and highways, at least 1,253 people died in road accidents in the state’s urban areas in 2019. The fatality during the same period stood at 4,080 in rural areas. The chief secretary has directed all collectors, SPs and RTOs to work in a coordinated manner to curb accidents and fatalities.
In the meeting, transport commissioner Arun Bothra presented a time series analysis of accident data and pointed out that from November to March 2021-2022, most accidents occurred between 3 pm and 9 pm. He added that about 37% of the accidents were reported on national highways. Overspeeding was the main cause of the accidents.
Bothra said a number of technological interventions, infrastructure, capacity building, awareness initiatives, camera surveillance system on highways, e-enforcement at toll gates, e-challan system, integrated road accident database, first responders training (Rakshak) and refresher training for heavy motor vehicle drivers (Vahak) have been taken up to reduce accidents and fatalities.
There has been a steady rise in the number of fatalities from 2014 (3,931 deaths) to 2021 (5,081 deaths), an increase of about 29% during the period in Odisha. However, accidents and fatality rates came down in January and February this year compared to the corresponding two months in 2021. At least 961 accidents and 456 deaths were reported in January this year compared to 1,104 accidents and 492 deaths in January 2021.