On weekend, Lieutenant Governor chaired a high-level meeting to review the road safety measures in J&K.
The meeting, according to an official statement, was about the implementation of directions issued with regard to improving the road safety in J&K and steps taken since the previous meeting.
Among others, the Lieutenant Governor rightly directed for taking strict action against the violators who temper with speed limit devices installed in their vehicles.
There is also a need for completion of works related to identifying black spots along highways and utilisation of the road safety fund, the LG stressed and correctly so.
As per officials 100 unauthorized cuts have been plugged, besides crash barriers along 98.65 Kms and 3104 speed limit signages have also been erected since April last year.
There is need for developing a robust mechanism to check the health status of drivers, the LG stressed in the right direction.
Among others, there is need for concerned departments to conduct causative analysis of road accidents for multi-pronged road safety strategies. Besides there is need for completing the works of crash barriers installation at the identified spots.
Barely any day passes by when no precious life is lost to accidents in Jammu and Kashmir. According to data available with the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, there were 449002 accidents across India, claiming 151113 lives in 2019.
In 2020, 131714 fatalities were reported as a result of 366138 accidents while in 2021, 153972 people lost lives in 412432 accidents.
As per the yearly analysis of available data, road accidents occur due to multiple causes such as over speeding, use of mobile phones, drunken driving and drugs, driving on the wrong side of lane indiscipline, jumping red light, vehicular condition, weather condition, road condition and fault of driver, cyclist or pedestrian etc.
There is a need for the transition to a professional road environment which requires the implementation of first-tier reforms that deal with the quality of road infrastructure, facilities for susceptible users and zero-tolerance enforcement of rules by a trained, professional and empowered machinery.
Traditionally, people and administration has been quite slow in taking effective steps to improve among others the engineering of roads. Nonetheless the regular reviews taken by the top administrators are welcome and actions ordered to be taken need to be translated into real action at the ground level to save precious lives from being lost in the accidents.