10K signages to foster safe driving along all major roads including nat'l highways

In order to avoid road accidents, the state police is all set to put up around 10,000 road signages along all major roads including national highways in the state.

The task will begin by the end of April and will be complete within one month. The state transport department has funded the project to set up 10,000 road signages that will cost around Rs 3.37 crore.

This comes at a time when Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has launched state-wide road safety awareness campaign "Safe Drive, Save Life" and it may be mentioned that the Road Safety Week all across the state has been initiated on Monday. According to a senior police officer of the West Bengal Traffic Police, the step has been taken to bring down the number of road accidents. Superintendents and commissioners of all the police commissionerates were asked to identify the locations where putting up of road signages was essential.

The work to identify the stretch of roads where more road signage was necessary is already complete. Thus, the work to set up the road signages will be done very soon.

The officer added that the reason of an accident may vary from case to case.

Some may happen due to road conditions. For example, there are many stretches of roads where there are sharp turns which often lead to accidents.

Again, there are places where accident is inevitable if one drives a car or rides a bike above a certain speed. Thus, putting up of road signages indicating speed limits is absolutely essential.

An assessment was carried out to identify that which road sign needs to be put up on a particular stretch of road. It may be mentioned that this is the first time when a major drive has been taken to put up road signages along all important roads across the state.

There are adequate signages along the roads which are under the jurisdiction of Kolkata Police or other police commissionerates. With setting up of 10,000 road signages, it is expected that there won't be any accident due to its unavailability.

Road signages also help in averting accidents after sun down as it glows when light of a vehicle falls on it and drivers are alerted about the sharp bends or any further information regarding the road.

Though it is the responsibility of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to put up road signs along the national highways, the state traffic police have taken up this job. At the same time, the top brass of the state traffic police wrote to the NHAI and state Public Works Department (PWD) to provide more signages.