Yesterday’s bus tragedy in Udhampur District, in which 21 people reportedly lost their lives, should be handled differently to set a new benchmark. It should serve as a strong lesson for enforcement authorities and the commercial transport sector to follow safety rules strictly, without any exceptions.
This incident has shocked the people across the lines with people at the helm starting from Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, LG Manoj Sinha, CM Omar Abdullah to Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh sharing grief and anguish over the tragic incident. Going by this, it becomes necessary that people who matters should set priorities in this matter by first focusing on the treatment bring provided to the injured passengers, then hassle-free disbursement of the compensation announced, and soon after a thorough probe that how a bus with allowed capacity of 42 passengers was carrying over 65 passengers and was moving recklessly on a road which requires extra care due to difficult turns and terrain?
Before landing upside down on the road, the ill-fated falling bus also crushed an auto-rickshaw, in which reportedly 17 passengers were travelling, which again raises big questions against the working of traffic police and other enforcement authorities as the said vehicle was also overloaded at the time of accident with 8 passengers more than the limit of 9 passengers. This incident should be taken as a wake-up call because it seems that not one, not two but all the public transport vehicles have been operating in the region giving two hoots to the traffic norms and authorities.
This grave situation points to a larger pattern of negligence, weak enforcement, and a casual approach towards public safety. Overloading, over-speeding, and ignoring basic safety norms seem to be in vogue, that too in full view of authorities, which is quite dangerous and worrisome. The time has come to stop this carelessness and ensure rule of law on the roads of the Union Territory or else people will continue to perish in such mishaps which of course are preventable, if authorities and the stakeholders work toward streamlining the movement of vehicles and ensuring compliance of traffic rules.
To set an example, it is necessary that traffic police staff deputed on the stretch where this tragic mishap occurred should be terminated from the services because to save people from these avoidable accidents, government should have to take stringent and out of the box steps because allowing things to continue will not bring any change as was seen in the past.
