Safety measures: Awareness camp on use of pool car held

Kolkata: Highlighting the Vehicle Location Tracking Device (VLTD) which has already been fitted in at least 10 per cent of the pool cars under the Pool Car Owners Welfare Association, the organisation held an awareness camp on Monday to attract parents to the pool car concept.

“So far we have been successful. Many parents had come and taken the pamphlets being distributed mentioning details and contacts of valid members operating pool cars in different parts of the city. Few have also come and registered their children for the service,” the secretary of the pool car association Sudip Dutta said.

State Transport minister Snehasis Chakraborty had announced that the deadline for the installation of VLTD and panic buttons to be extended till May 31 instead of March 31.

The camp was conducted at a school in South Kolkata. “There is a misconception that pool cars are unsafe. Many are running pool cars under a fake identity. Parents need to separate legitimate ones from others. To identify the same, they can check if the number plate is a white (private) or a yellow (commercial) one. Even under commercial, pool cars have a separate registration. Only after checking these details, choose a pool car,” Dutta said.

The state Transport department had made it compulsory for commercial vehicles to fit VLTD and panic buttons. This initiative also included pool cars, and following the directive, they installed VLTD in at least 10 per cent of their fleet and aim at soon installing it in all vehicles. According to Dutta, all vehicles already had GPS trackers but they have taken the state government’s directive on VLTD positively.

One of the parents, whose two children study in the same school said: “It is an environmentally-friendly way of transport, where instead of 15 students using 15 private vehicles can coming together in a single vehicle.”