National Road Safety Week to be launched on Monday, a priority that was overdue

Thirtieth National Road Safety Week will be inaugurated on Monday which

will include a motorcar rally, among several other events, which would be flagged off to commemorate the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, Union External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Union Minister for Road Transport & Highways, Shipping and Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation Nitin Gadkari, and Union Minister of State for Road Transport & Highways, Shipping and Chemicals and Fertilisers Mansukh L Mandaviya will inaugurate the Week, here.

The event, which will take place at Gandhi Smriti and Darshan, Rajghat, will be attended by a host of school children, NGOs, and stakeholders in road safety from Government and industry.

Various programmes will be held during the Road Safety Week, including seminars and workshops on Emerging Trends in Safety, Road Safety Engineering, Motor Vehicle Insurance, Emergency care (Protection of Good Samaritan & First Responder Training), Role of Youth, and Industry/ Corporate Conclave on Role of Corporate in Road Safety.

These will be attended by representatives of OEMs, ACMA, test agencies, road engineers, auditors and road construction companies, corporates, NGOs, insurance companies, medical staff, and college students. School Bus Driver Refresher Training session will also be held at IDTR, Sarai Kale Khan, where bus drivers from private schools will be imparted training on road safety.

A car rally will also be flagged off on the occasion to commemorate the 150th Birth Anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

It will travel through places historically associated with Gandhiji, both in India, as well as in Bangladesh and Myanmar. It will connect the places of significance in Gandhiji’s life, and simultaneously take up advocacy on Road Safety concerns, an official statement said here.

The rally will pass through Sabarmati, Porbandar, Dandi, Yerwada, Sewagram, Jabalpur, Lucknow, Gorakhpur, Chauri Chaura, Champaran, Shantiniketan and Kolkata in India before travelling to Dhaka in Bangladesh. It will conclude at Yangon in Myanmar on February 24.

It will cover around 7,250 km to reach Yangon. This is part of the year-long celebrations to commemorate the 150th year of Mahatma Gandhi in India and across the globe, initiated by the Union Government on October 2 last year.(UNI)