Lowest road casualties on Holi in five years

Holi celebrations in the Capital this year saw the least number of casualties in road accidents –compared to the last five years – with four people dying on Thursday, police said on Friday.

“Four people died in road accidents in Delhi. Two of them were killed because the motorcycles they were riding slipped, while the other two were hit by two over-speeding vehicles in different parts of the city,” Special Commissioner of Police (Traffic) Muktesh Chander said. The first incident occurred in central Delhi’s Panchkuian Road, where a 43-year-old woman riding pillion died after the motorcycle she was on collided with a metro pillar. In another incident, a 50-year-old man died after his bike slipped in outer Delhi’s Khanjhawla area. The other two casualties included a 36-year-old crushed to death by a Xylo car in North-west Delhi and a 20-year-old killed by an unidentified vehicle in the Sultanpuri area. In 2015, the number of deaths due to road accidents was eight while in 2014, 2013 and 2012 the number was 11, 14 and 13 respectively.

Meanwhile, Delhi Police collected Rs 5.51 lakh from 5,624 motorists challaned on Holi for violating traffic norms. “On the occasion of Holi, traffic police challaned 5,624 motorists under different rules of traffic violation like drunken driving, triples riding and stunt driving. We collected Rs 5,51,100 from the motorists. All the challans were issued between 8 am and 4 pm,” Chander said.

Of those challaned, 313 were booked for over-speeding, 218 for dangerous driving, 1,941 for drunken driving, 2,129 for not wearing helmets, 499 for riding triples on two-wheelers, 130 for wrong side driving and 394 for other offences. The traffic police also impounded 1,085 vehicles during its special drive on Holi. “At least 403 traffic police teams were deployed across the city to curb hooliganism and violation of traffic rules,” said Chander.

On Wednesday night, traffic police had reported 558 drunken driving cases, with the highest 264 cases in south Delhi. Delhi Police statistics revealed that the traffic police collected Rs 9.22 crore from motorists challaned in January and February. “The money collected from challans in 2015 was over Rs 64.53 crore while the amount was a little bit high in 2014 with the collection over Rs 71.04 crore.”