BENGALURU: The final day of the 31st National Road Safety Week saw the city traffic and police commissioners addressing school students on the need for road safety. This year’s theme was Bringing Change Through Youth Power. The Police and Transport Departments conducted week-long awareness activities.
“In 2018, 10,990 people died in road accidents in Karnataka and 47 % of the deceased were pedestrians and two-wheeler riders; most of them were in the age group of 18-37 years. The youth need to get educated on the horrors of road accidents,” said Additional Director General of Police and Commissioner of Traffic and Road Safety, P S Sandhu.
Sandh and Police Commissioner Bhaskar Rao said, “About 850 people die in Bengaluru due to road accidents every year. The change has to come from the youth. They need to wear seat belts and helmets. We treat the vehicle as our own but treat the road as someone else’s.”
“India signed a declaration to reduce road traffic deaths and injuries by half by 2020. Unfortunately, we have unable to achieve this target. We see news on road accidents everyday but do not feel anything until one of our own dies or gets injured,” said Ravikanthe Gowda, Joint Commissioner of Police (Traffic).
Students of various government and private schools in the city received awards, for participating in essay, drawing and band competitions, which were held throughout the week. The theme of all the competitions was road safety. A brochure and calendar on road safety was released during the event.