Underage drivers behind most of city deaths
Twenty-eight road accidents on average occur in the capital every day and underage drivers of public transport are mostly responsible.
The Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) launched a special drive against the underage drivers from Friday and 14 minor boys were arrested at the wheel on the first day.
The DMP authorities since December 1 also intensified the ongoing drive against fake driving licences and on Friday arrested 135 drivers for the offence.
These were revealed by DMP Commissioner AKM Shahidul Haque at an Eid reunion programme for journalists arranged by his office at Rajarbagh Police Lines in the capital yesterday.
He added, in the first phase the law enforcers will arrest the underage drivers as a warning to their employers and later the DMP will take steps against them (employers).
"Over 70 percent drivers of the public vehicles carry fake licences in the capital and they are the most irresponsible and inefficient," he said.
DMP Joint Commissioner (Traffic) Shafiqur Rahman told The Daily Star underage drivers cannot maintain balance due to physical and mental immaturity, resulting in frequent accidents.
He said the DMP commissioner himself nearly fell victim to an underage driver and narrowly escaped accident at an intersection near the High Court on Friday.
Underage drivers mainly run most of the human haulers and minibuses on different routes in the capital, DMP sources say.
However, the DMP sources could not give the number of the underage drivers running vehicles in the capital.
On the newly introduced three-lane system and reintroduced signal lights in place of manual controlling, Shahidul said, "We know the systems will not reduce or remove nagging traffic congestion completely, but it will ease jam to a great extent."
He added the trend of violating rules by pedestrians and drivers tarnish the image of the country abroad as many foreigners live or visit the city regularly.
The DMP authorities launched a weeklong campaign on December 1 in a bid to develop a habit of observance of the traffic rules among the motorists.
From December 8 onward the authorities will start fining the motorists in case of violation of the three-lane system.
The authorities in the first phase have started to demarcate the lanes on three major roads and later other roads will also be demarcated.
The authorities started fining motorists for violating signal lights introduced to replace manual control system on November 23, sources say.
The DMP commissioner said he and his joint commissioners are monitoring the activities of the personnel implementing the systems and conducting the drives against underage drivers and fake licences.
He added he made 12 teams, each headed by a deputy commissioner (DC), in this regard.
Comments