App-solute safety

Gurnaaz Kaur

There are certain things that have a mention in newspapers everyday and among them is the growing number of road accidents. Regular statistics emerge with new numbers; there are initiatives taken to spread awareness on traffic rules, educate people on speed limits and lane driving, etc. Every step matters and adding to these initiatives is Chandigarh lad Tanuj Mittal, who has come up with an application to promote safe driving and provide emergency care to accident victims.

Prevention is better than cure, but sometimes even timely cure helps a great deal. And this app called Guardian-Be Safe aims to help anyone who needs help. 

“When it comes to emergency care of an accident victim, the first hour after the accident is called the ‘golden hour’ because the way the victim is handled in that one hour has the maximum effect on his survival chances. To ensure that the victim gets the best possible medical assistance in that hour, it is important to inform the family members of the victim on time,” Tanuj says. 

He points out that the usual way to inform a victim’s family member is to get his details from the RTO and then send someone to the address. This is a time-consuming process. Tanuj promises that with his app, things can become simpler and quick. “All that a vehicle owner needs to do is register his/her vehicle number and emergency contacts in this app and in case of an accident, any passerby or police can trigger an alert through the app and information is sent to the selected contacts immediately.” This app got functional a month ago and already has over 20,000 downloads. It also has solutions for wrong parking and road rage. 

There are pre-set messages in the app and if someone finds a wrongly parked car blocking their car or driveway, instead of deflating its tyres, all he needs to do is enter the car number in the app and send a preset message. 

“The app doesn’t disclose any personal details of the users and doesn’t allow custom messages,” he shares. The idea to make this free of cost app dawned on Tanuj when he saw social media flooded with posts on accidents and road rage. “I saw people using social media to post disturbing pictures of mangled vehicles with a request to share and spread the word till it reaches the family of the accident victim. People also use social media to shame and abuse people who have parked their car wrongly. I realized that these problems could be solved just by a click,” he explains.