Now, volunteers to help in regulating city traffic

Kuldip Bhatia

Ludhiana, December 31

The police have launched a ‘traffic marshal scheme’ with the objective to solicit people’s participation in traffic regulation. The scheme is intended to promote people’s involvement in regulation of traffic with a view to ensuring smooth movement of vehicular traffic and to inculcating road sense in public and pedestrians.

Commissioner of Police (CP) Rakesh Agrawal said the traffic marshals would function purely as voluntary associates of the traffic police in the city. They will not be entitled to any salary, allowance or payment in any form whatsoever, either in cash or kind for performing this duty. Every traffic marshal shall be required to undergo a short course of training and fixed duty hours and location would be given as per the convenience of the traffic marshal.

Agrawal said it was expected that a traffic marshal would work at least six hours per week. Persons from 16 to 65 years of age could apply for appointment as traffic marshal. “In case the age of traffic marshal is below 18 years, then consent of one of his parents/guardian will be mandatory and such students will be deployed under close supervision of their schoolteachers near to their schools only.”

Further, the traffic marshals will be give dummy challan books and they will have the powers to issue dummy challans, where there will be no monetary fines, but the traffic violator will be required to perform traffic duty for up to 8 hours as decided by the traffic committee as a mark of society service.

The CP added that application for appointment as traffic marshal has to be made online only on the mobile app of Traffic Marshal Ludhiana Police which can be downloaded from the Google play store.

“Traffic marshals will be given ID cards and certificates.

We are looking forward to enrolling at least 2000 traffic marshals who will deployed in batches of 20 on each chowk, such that only 4-5 traffic marshals of the batch come every day by rotation. We will be covering 100 chowks and other important traffic points gradually. The enrolment will be open from January 1 to 20, 2020, and after training, deployment of traffic marshals will commence,” he said.

Agrawal made a fervent appeal to the schools, NGOs , NCC wings, ex-servicemen, clubs and other organisations to come forward and be part of this initiative. He said attendance of the traffic marshals will be managed online to monitor their performance objectively.

Salient features of the scheme

• Traffic marshal shall undergo a short course of training
• Fixed duty hours and location will be given to each traffic marshal as per convenience
• Persons from 16 to 65 years of age could apply for appointment on the mobile app of Traffic Marshal Ludhiana Police
• Will have powers to issue dummy challans with no monetary fines
• At least 2000 traffic marshals will be be deployed in batches of 20 at each chowk, such that only four or five marshals come every day by rotation.
• The enrolment will be open from January 1 to 20, 2020

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