WAKE UP, OH YOUTH!
Road Safety Scenario in India:
world. In 2015 with the number of deaths rose nearly 5% to 1.46 lakh. Major reasons which
account for the mammoth figure are:
- Driving drunk
- Using phone while driving
- Not using pedestrian crossings for crossing roads
- Rash driving.
- Low proportion of untrained drivers
- Lack of positive driving culture
Who can take the Torch Ahead?
India has the world's largest youth population with more than 65% population below the age of 35. In future, policies are going to be made by the youth for the youth. Therefore, youth certainly has a significant role to play in Road Safety due to large proportion in population and high motivation level to bring change into the society.What youth can achieve?
I had an appalling experience when I saw the video of a child who had just visited Singapore and was fascinated by the Road Safety systems in place. The video can be seen here Road Safety Practices in Singapore and is used by www.publicsafetyindia.com for motivational purpose. The child in the video seems to be determined to change the Road Safety Systems of India.The child notices:
- Automatic Pedestrian Road Crossing Signal
- Zebra Lines
- Drivers as responsible drivers who let the citizen cross the road first
- Push Based Signal system for crossing the road
People may reject the determined attitude of the child disregarding as not practical as per Indian context, and emotional approach. In addition, people may say that such big policies makers have failed to bring change, what will this child’s do? But that is where the youth has to change the mindset. Youth is new to the world and therefore has not been gripped by the narrow minded system. Nobody has ever been able to stop new birds from flying just because old ones’ feathers have been cut away due to the dangers. The youth has the power to Create and Innovate; they can develop Analytics based Road Safety systems, Video Analytics for rule violation, Automatic road crossing signals etc. The youth has a Voice; they can help government by identifying risk prone zones, U-turns, dividers across the roads, running road safety promotional campaigns in Colleges and Universities, etc. As said by Swami Vivekananda “What we want are some young men who will renounce everything for country’s sake, the country will be transformed”.
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