Editorial
Another tragedy on highway
Put highway safety measures without much ado
Following the tragedy at Mirsarai, where 44 students were killed in a truck accident, now we have another gruesome bus-truck collision on a highway at Bogra that killed 18 and injured 21. The image of the smashed bus carried by this paper tells you all about the horrifying impact the commuters must have experienced.
After every mishap, we mourn the tragic deaths of hapless passengers and keep urging the authorities to come out with effective measures to put a halt to these preventable accidents but they just wait to happen, which the inaction points to.
This time too, it was purely the driver's fault, by all accounts. An injured passenger said the driver seemed drowsy and was driving recklessly. In spite of warnings to drive carefully, clearly he looked the other way.
It beats all imagination, as to how could the drivers, after hearing of all the accidents that have been taking place all over the country, afford to be so utterly negligent of the simple fact that safety of the passengers was in their hands?
Reckless driving by unskilled drivers, that too with fake licenses; over-speeding and indifference to road signs are the established reasons for accidents to happen.
Now a word about the highway patrol police. This seems to be on paper only because lack of their visibility on highways is conspicuous by itself. The authorities must get a move on this with highway patrol organized along the standard operational practices. Given the rate of accidents this aspect should receive top priority.
Is it that difficult to bring discipline on the highways? Can we not motivate the drivers to be careful, law abiding and sensitive to passengers' safety? This is where the private and public transporters will have to come in a big way to roll back indiscipline on the highway.
The communications ministry, the associations of transport owners and operators and members of the law enforcing agencies should immediately sit, devise effective measures and coordinate to save the lives of a growing number of commuters that hit the streets everyday. The impunity with which the killer drivers escape the hands of law must be put to an end.
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