Karachi : The trend of riding motorcycles without wearing protective helmet is resulting in fatal injuries to bikers and out of 170 casualties of road accidents during the first four months of this year, 89 victims were motorcyclists.
This was told to a meeting held here to review the road safety program in Karachi, convened b y Consultant on Home Affairs Sharafuddin Memon and attended by principal investigator Road Traffic Injury Research & prevention Center (RTIPC) Dr Abdul Rasheed Hussain, consultant RT/RPC and ex-IGP Sindh Asad Jahangir, program manager RT/RPC Syed Ameer Hussain and DIGP Traffic Capital City Police Karachi Khurran Gulzar. The meeting was told that the home department and traffic police Karachi have planned a comprehensive awareness campaign followed by an enforcement drive in respect of wearing protective helmets during use of motorcycles. The meeting expressed concern about growing fatalities of motorcyclists in road accidents. It was told that from January 1, 2011 to April 25, 2011 170 road accident deaths were reported, of which 89 were motorcyclists. According to a report prepared by GIG Traffic Karachi motorcyclists constitute 52.35precent of total fatal accidents and in most of such accidents riders died due to serious head injuries. From January 1, 2011 to April 25, 2011 58 pedestrians were killed and 61 injured, five paddle cyclists killed and three injured, 89 motorbikes were killed and 79 injured, besides 18 other road users killed and 101 injured in various fatal and non-fatal road accidents. The meeting deiced to draft a summary for Sindh chief minister with regard to replicate highway policemodule in Karachi traffic police to bring sustainable reforms in traffic system. It was informed that a PC-1 had already been drafted and submitted to improve following of traffic rules.The meeting decided to raise fine money to discourage traffic violations as a whole. The home department undertook to prepare a working paper in due consultation with the Karachi traffic police inthis regard and obtain approval thereof from the competent authority.The DIG Traffic Karachi told the meeting that 15percent of the deposited challan money is being provided as welfare money to the traffic cops, on yearly basis. It was decided to raise the same from 15 to 50percent for utilization in various traffic reform projects, as well. The DIG traffic Karachi was directed to prepare a summary in the regard. PPI