First college of traffic management opens

What can bring in discipline in road usage in the NCR and bring down rate of road fatalities—proper education or harsh penalty?

What can bring in discipline in road usage in the NCR and bring down rate of road fatalities—proper education or harsh penalty?

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If the head of the AIIMS Trauma Centre Dr Mahesh Mishra is to be believed, Delhi can register a steep decline in road fatalities only by a manifold rise in penalty and putting road signages scientifically.

“Awareness or education can hardly bring in any major relief. Despite statutory warnings on cigarette packs, people do not stop smoking. Unless

they feel the pinch of the fine, road accidents cannot be reduced,” said Mishra in the inaugural programme of India’s first College of Traffic Management (CTM), an initiative of the Institute of Road Traffic Education (IRTE) at Faridabad on Wednesday.

The Motor Vehicle Amendment Committee recently has proposed an increase in penalty for traffic law violations by at least three times in the proposed amendment of the Act.

Besides penalty, he talked about scientific road signages. “The rate of road fatalities

has come down in Delhi in 2010 and that seems to have happened due to correct placement of road signs before CWG," he said.

Praveen Sood, IGP and Additional Commissioner of Police (traffic), Bangalore, who was also present at the function, said, “Road fatalities drastically reduced in Bangalore after we got the road signages corrected and educated the road users with the help of IRTE."

It is worth mentioning that the Delhi government, in a meeting last month, has the assigned International Road Federation, an NGO, to identify locations where road signs are wrongly placed. “We will then ask the MCD and PWD to replace them,” said chief secretary Rakesh Mehta.

IRF chairman, KK Kapila, said: “We will soon start the process and take photographs of the faulty signages.”

Emphasising on the need for road traffic education, Rohit Baluja, president, IRTE said: “Proper education about road safety can bring down accidents on roads drastically. CTM aims to educate people in all the areas of traffic management.”