Novel initiative to create traffic awareness
| Date :13-Feb-2020 |
By Kaushik Bhattacharya :
Armed with an endeavour to spread awareness about road safety and traffic rules among motorists, a group of surgeons in Nagpur initiated a motivating initiative through ‘Gandhigiri’. They gift roses to traffic violators at different signals to embarrass motorists for their act. Along with this, the group conducts traffic awareness lectures and seminars at different colleges under the banner of Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons of India.
“The time has come when the public must be sensitised about the perils of rash driving, not strapping the seat belt, not wearing helmet, using cell phone while driving and other things,” said Dr Ramakrishna Shenoi, Vice Dean, VSPM’s Dental College and Research Centre to The Hitavada. “Road safety education is vital for people of all ages. As a responsible citizen, you should be aware of each and every road safety rules. Observation is the key skill you need learn in ensuring road safety.
Safety education begins right from your school. By obeying safety rules and regulations, you can save yourself and others on the road,” said Dr Shenoi. Dr Shenoi appreciated the campaign ‘Our Roads Our Lives’ initiated by ‘The Hitavada’ to sensitise people and administration about the traffic chaos in the city. He also wished The Hitavada to continue the campaign for the welfare of the society. civic sense to sensitise motorists of the city. The film is available on You Tube and it is getting good response too. “Road safety education is need of the hour and it must be started from school and college level. We have conducted many awareness events at college-level and different institutions.
Now, we are planning to conduct these at Junior Colleges because this is the stage when the students get their first two-wheeler,” said Dr Shenoi. The activities of the group is appreciated by Traffic Police. Even they included traffic cops at different traffic signals to make aware commuters to follow traffic rules. In India, the motor vehicle population is growing at a faster rate than the economic and population growth. The surge in motorisation coupled with expansion of the road network has brought with it the challenge of addressing adverse factors such as the increase in road accidents.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), road traffic injuries are the sixth leading cause of death in India with a greater share of hospitalisation, deaths, disabilities and socio-economic losses in the young and middle-aged population. “Basic surgical training to citizens is needed. It will help to reduce fatality at the time of mishap. Hence, our Association is also providing basic surgical training to youth to tackle emergency situation,” Dr Shenoi stated. Dr Shenoi said, “Proper traffic engineering on city roads is missing. The roads are constructed haphazardly. Instead of imposing complete blame on commuters the administration must rectify these loopholes to increase road safety for citizens.”