Student volunteers to help cops manage traffic in Sambalpur of Odisha
SAMBALPUR: Reeling under staff crunch and growing traffic in the city, Sambalpur police on Saturday launched the Student Traffic Volunteers Scholarship Scheme (STVSS) at Reserve Police Line here. Sambalpur is the third city after Bhubaneswar and Cuttack to launch the scheme which will help in regulating traffic besides creating massive awareness.
The scheme was launched in the presence of Revenue Divisional Commissioner (North) D V Swamy, Inspector General of Police (Northern Range) Sushanta Kumar Nath, Registrar of Sambalpur University Soorya Thankppan, SP Sanjeev Arora and Additional District Magistrate Trilochan Majhi.
Arora said 100 students from different colleges of Sambalpur, Burla and Hirakud have been selected and enrolled under the scheme for a period of six months. They have been provided with requisite training and will assist the traffic police in traffic management in the city. The volunteers will also be involved in traffic awareness and have been provided with identity card, certificate, shoe, cap and T-shirt to avoid any kind of confrontation, he added.
The SP said volunteers have been selected based on the recommendations by the principals of the colleges and will get stipend of `100 for assisting the police personnel in regulating traffic for three hours. Odisha Road Safety Society has provided the fund for implementation of the scheme.
Traffic awareness programme is being undertaken in various educational institutions and the launching of STVSS would make the effort of the police more effective. Police have set a mission to reduce road accidents by 25 per cent during the current fiscal and only mass awareness can help achieve the goal, he added.