Road accident deaths: Why can't police find the drivers
A slogan stating that a road accident causes a lifetime of grief, is often found written on different vehicles and bus terminals. But no one in the government, no drivers, nor the investigating agencies seem to comprehend the essence of this slogan.
First thing to do after a road crash is to identify the causes. Find the driver if it was he who caused the accident. And if there were any faults in the vehicle, both the owner and driver have to take the blame.
On the other hand, if the crash is caused from road-mismanagement, it’s necessary to take action against people concerned.
Without fair investigation into each and every accident, it cannot be discerned who is responsible.
The question of taking legal action against liable persons comes only after they have been identified.
Prothom Alo reported on 10 June, in 42 per cent cases of road accidents in Dhaka where people had been killed, drivers cannot be traced.
In many cases it’s noticed that when a vehicle meets with an accident the driver and their assistant flee.
In the last two and a half years, 492 cases have been filed under the road transport act with 50 police stations of Dhaka city, 275 of which has already been investigated.
Meanwhile in 116 of the cases, police have submitted final report at the court after failing to identify the drivers responsible for people’s death.
Police however did identify the drivers responsible for deaths in road crashes in 159 cases.
There are closed circuit television (CCTV) cameras installed in almost all the streets of Dhaka. Even the number of policemen patrolling the roads is high. Despite that, if drivers remain untraced in 42 per cent of the cases, the situation in other areas isn't hard to discern.
Nirapad Sarak Chai (NISCHA) chairman Ilias Kanchan was right in saying that it is unnatural to fail to identify or capture those who ran over people on streets in a city where there are CCTV cameras on almost every street and alley.
There are 22,476 kilometres of regional and national highways with 217,000 rural roads across the country. As many as 5.6 million (56 lakh) registered vehicles move on these roads.
The majority of people dying in road crashes are abled-bodied people who work.
So the deaths of these people leave the whole family helpless. It’s also tough to continue the running case in this situation.
Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA) has drivers’ fingerprints, photo identity card, vehicle registration number etc. in their possession.
Failure to identify the driver even after that has raised many questions. Family members of many victims have said that accused drivers could have been tracked down if only the police were sincere.
If one driver gets away with causing an accident, others will become reckless as well. This chaos and deaths of people on the streets cannot be tolerated.
We hope that BRTA and the police will work in unison to catch the accused drivers without blaming each other. If the government wants to stop the death trail of road accidents, accused drivers must be brought to justice after investigating every single accident.