Bhubaneswar: An MoU for ‘Junior Rakshak’ has been signed between Commerce and Transport Department and NCC Directorate in the Convention Hall of Lok Seva Bhavan this morning.
Additional Commissioner Transport (Road Safety) Lalmohan Sethi and Director NCC, Odisha Sagar K Mohanty signed the MoU. About 63,000 cadets of the National Cadet Corps will work as ‘Junior Rakshaks’ in the road safety sector.
They will acquire road safety education, training and make a resolute commitment to prevent the risk of road accidents and save precious lives.
Minister of Commerce and Transport, Tukuni Sahu, Development Commissioner Anu Garg, Principal Secretary of Commerce and Transport Usha Padhi, Transport Commissioner Amitabh Thakur, CMD of Odisha State Police Housing and Welfare Corporation Santosh Bala and Colonel Sagar K. Mohanty, Director of Odisha NCC Directorate were present.
Minister Shrimati Sahu inaugurated the automated driving testing system at 6 places in the state namely Angul, Dhenkanal, Rourkela, Sundargarh, Keonjhar and Ganjam.
Most of the accidents happen due to lack of adequate knowledge about traffic rules and road signs. This automated driving testing system is going to be implemented under 5-T initiative. Automated driving testing system will help reduce accidents by competent drivers.
Automated driving testing system will speed up the testing process for driving license applicants and it will be more efficient and transparent than the manual testing process.
In the last 2-3 years, accidents due to vehicles parked on the roadside have increased by 220% and 852 people have died. Due to lack of parking facilities within the district, heavy motor vehicles are frequently stuck on roadsides, long distance drivers are often stressed to reach their destinations, insufficient sleep is a major contributor to road accidents.
For this, the Department of Commerce and Transport is going to construct truck terminals across the state for initiating a number of initiatives like provide better cargo handling, fuel and other facilities to the drivers, from proper training and testing of drivers, places for rest for long route drivers, distribution of free late-night tea to drivers etc.
Development Commissioner Shrimati Garg, said that about 20,000 people died in the 1999 cyclone, but we were able to reduce the death toll to zero by taking decisive action in subsequent cyclones.
With the same determination and cooperation of 63 thousand NCC cadets, we can also reduce our road accident deaths considerably.
Principal Secretary Shrimati Padhi emphasized on the role of students to create road safety awareness among the general public.
Transport Commissioner, Amitabh Thakur thanked all the participants for their continuous commitment towards road safety. The program concluded with the launch of book “Road Accidents in Odisha”, which provides valuable information about road accident trends in the state.
