153 lives lost in 450 accidents till Aug

Tribune News Service

Faridabad, September 23

With traffic control and management in the most populated city of Haryana being a victim of ‘poor’ police strength, travelling on the city roads has become largely unsafe . The first eight months of the year have seen 153 deaths in 450 accidents.

While the department officials revealed that the police issued a total of 18,643 challans in August this year, it, however, could not prevent 52 accidents that claimed 19 lives and resulted in injuries to 53 others in the same month.

The average rate of challans here has been 22,000 each month. The total challans issued till August 31 this year has been a little over 1.76 lakh. The city, which got a Police Commissionerate system in 2009, has perhaps failed to get adequate staff or infrastructure for traffic management as there are only 170 cops posted in the department at present. The city has a population of 16 lakh. “Of these, 20 per cent cops or staff are not available for routine work due to VIP duty or leave and other reasons,” revealed sources.

“The thin strength of cops results in problems as chances of accidents go up sharply,” claimed a cop.

An odd 210 Home Guard jawans and members of NGO Road Safety Organisation (RSO) render help in managing traffic and rushing to help of accident victims.

Blaming poor cop strength and improper maintenance of traffic signals, SK Sharma, coordinator with RSO, said even getting a fused streetlight bulb replaced was a herculean task. The Greater Faridabad area, having a population of 50,000, has no permanently posted traffic cop. Around 20 persons die each month in an average of 56 accidents in the city, he claimed.

Admitting staff crunch, Hemant Kumar, SHO (Traffic), said efforts were on bring the accidents in the city under control with proper awareness and help from the NGOs. The DCP (Traffic) could not be contacted despite repeated attempts.