Partha urges guardians to submit details of pool car drivers to schools

Kolkata: State Education minister Partha Chatterjee asked all guardians whose wards travel to and from school in pool cars, to submit certain details of the vehicle and the driver with their respective schools.

The minister has also directed his department's secretary to issue an alert to the schools on having information about students who travel in pool cars and school buses.

The Education department is expected to hold a meeting on Tuesday for coming out with a standard operating procedure (SOP) to plug security loopholes associated with the pool cars.

The move comes in the wake of a pool car accident at Polba in Hooghly on Friday, allegedly due to overspeeding, in which two children were critically injured.

"I would urge the guardians to examine properly whether the pool cars that are ferrying their children to and from schools have fitness certificates. They should submit the photograph of the driver along with a copy of his driving licence to the school authorities, so that the latter can keep a track too. I have directed my department secretary to issue an alert over the same to the schools," said

Chatterjee after taking stock of the health condition of the two critically injured children at SSKM Hospital on Sunday.

Sources in the Transport department said that the state government may make yellow colour mandatory for school buses and pool cars and also make some sort of training compulsory for the drivers before taking to the wheels of these vehicles.

The department is likely to make an attendant compulsory in all the vehicles and the administration will strictly not allow any pool car without proper certificate of fitness (CF).

"We will soon come up with a guideline in this regard," a senior official of the state Transport department said.

It has been alleged that the vehicle in which the students of Polba were travelling did not possess proper fitness certificate. The vehicle that had picked up the injured students was also allegedly swapped during the course of their journey to school and they were made to board another car.

"The doctors have not yet given us permission to interrogate the pool car driver who has been hospitalised. We will surely delve into the issue of this vehicle swapping once we get the nod to grill him," a senior police official said.

"There should be training of pool car drivers at least once in a year. Parents should make their children ready beforehand to ensure that the pool car does not have to wait for picking them up. This would ensure that the pool cars do not hurry to reach school in time," said Madan Jana, secretary of Bally Pool Car Owners Welfare Association.