Police only measure to ensure road safety ?
Deployment of a number of traffic policemen on troublesome highways is the only measure the government is going to take to ensure road safety and ease public suffering during the Eid holidays.
On average, 125 people die in road accidents during the Eid every year. This year suffering of the people will be unusually "horrible" due to dilapidated conditions of all major roads and highways. Travel time on roads between the capital and the rest of the country has increased by more than double in most cases due to bad shape of the highways.
"We can only deploy traffic police to ease congestion on the highways ahead of the Eid to ease people's sufferings," said Communications Minister Syed Abul Hossain. He also advised drivers and vehicle owners to drive cautiously to avoid accidents.
However, experts suggest deployment of army on the highways to reduce public suffering and check reckless driving to minimise road crashes during the Eid festival.
Reckless driving, unfit vehicles, unskilled drivers and rush to get more trips for financial benefit cause plenty of road crashes every year during the two Eid festivals.
According to the Accident Research Institute (ARI) of Buet, on average 125 people die in road accidents every year during the Eid. Successive governments have however remained blindfolded taking no mid- or long-term measures to address the situation.
"Vehicular movement unusually intensifies during the Eid with huge unfit vehicles driven by unskilled drivers hitting the highways and causing accidents," said Prof Shamsul Hoque of civil engineering at Buet.
The highway police could not keep surveillance during the Muslims' largest festivals and there is normally no enforcement of laws on the highways during this period.
Prof Hoque, a former director of ARI, said unfortunately no governments took any long-term plan to ensure road safety. If the waterways and railways were developed, people would have safe journey during the Eid holidays, he observed.
If army is deployed on the highways during the festivals, there would be fewer accidents and less public suffering because they would maintain discipline in a tougher hand, he added.
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