Goodwill needs to reduce road accident

DU Correspondent :
Good will and conscious of the people and government’s positive response are required to decrease the road accident and for road safety.
The road accident increased by 30 percent last year comparing with the previous year. According to the Road Safety Foundation, there were 5,371 road accidents across the country last year. A total of 6,284 people were killed and 7,468 people were injured in these accidents.
Ilias Kanchan, founder of the movement for safe roads, held the government liable for those accidents and it could be averted if the government is serious.
“Government’s goodwill and proper management are very much needed to ensure road safety,” he said.
The National Award winning actor and social activists said this at a students rally on the
occasion of National Road Safety Day held on the Dhaka University (DU) campus.
Nirapad Sarak Chai, a platform of road safety movement, organized the rally at Raju Memorial Scripture of DU on Wednesday with a view to creating public awareness and ensuring safe roads.
Ilias Kanchan said, “Legal action will be taken effectively according to the existing law.”
He also demanded to make the seatbelt law like drivers for every passenger inside the car and requested to wear a standard helmet.
“People have to know that faster is more risky. About Tk 42,000 crore are lost every year due to road accidents,” he said.
He also urged to the government to implement the five pillars of the United Nations’ strategy saying that the pillars, road safety management, safer vehicles, safer road users, post-crash response, and safer driving environments, have decreased road clashes in many country for 70-80 percent.
“Despite creating development projects and way to earn money, so far no government of any time of the country has taken up this program that people will be respectful maintaining order,” he said.
Telling the road accident as a human making problem, Ilias Kanchan said, “It happened when we break the rules ignoring the others people’s right and to mitigate the suffering for traffic jam.