Poor visibility causes most mishaps: Cops

Police conduct special drive, take action against vehicles sans proper wipers, reflectors, indicators, tail lamps

Poor visibility causes most mishaps: Cops

Police conduct special drive, take action against vehicles sans proper wipers, reflectors, indicators, tail lamps

Pooru00a0visibility while driving is the major reason behind the rising number of accidents in the city. Concerned over this, police officials from the traffic branch conducted a special drive and took action against nearly 1,500 vehicles without proper wipers, reflectors, indicators, tail lamps and other such requirements. Besides visibility issues, lack of regular maintenance of vehicles and untrained drivers were also among the key reasons behind accidents on city roads and highways, said Deputy Commissioner of Police (Traffic) Vishwas Pandhare.

Keep eyes peeled: The traffic police with the help of locals had
conducted a campaign in May to make motorists aware of the need to
install reflectors, tail lamps and indicators on their vehicles. File pic

"It has been observed that most of the accidents that take place on city roads and highways are caused by owners not maintaining their vehicles properly. Private cars are usually looked after, but drivers and owners of cars-on-rent, tempos, trucks and other heavy vehicle are negligent about the basic requirements," Pandhare said. "Reflectors, indicators, side mirrors, wipers, headlamps and tail-lamps are not paid attention to and in most cases these are not in working condition."

To drive home the point that vehicle equipment to aid visibility was a must for the purposes of road safety, a special campaign was undertaken. "In a special seven-day drive conducted since June 13, cases have been registered against 1,423 vehicles and a fine of Rs 3.4 lakh collected by the traffic branch," Police Inspector Vijaykumar Palsule said. "Of the 1,423 cases, 578 were about wipers, 344 about reflectors, 234 about tail lamps and others for things like side mirror, tyres, headlamps, mudguards and such." Palsule said action was also taken against 843 heavy vehicles violating traffic rules, 230 people who were under the influence of alcohol while driving and 51 people driving their vehicles in a rashly.u00a0

Fatal past
Statistics available with the traffic branch show that in just the 165 days from January to mid-June this year, 735 accidents were reported, out of which 192 were fatal in which 208 people lost their lives. These accidents include those which took place on internal city roads, highways and the Expressway. In light of these statistics, DCP Pandhare appealed to citizens and heavy vehicle drivers to take precautions and install reflectors, tail lamps and indicators on their vehicles and keep these in working order to avoid accidents.