Motor Vehicle department under the aegis of RTO Kathua organized a Medical Camp cum awareness programme to observe Road Safety Week in collaboration with ISM (AYUSH) Kathua in the premises of Truck Union Kathua for drivers/conductors/operators of commercial vehicles.ARTO Kathua, President Kathua Truck Union and drivers in large number attended the programme. RTO, Kathua Amarjeet Singh apprised that 1.2 million people die in road accidents every year worldwide. In India one accident takes place every minutes and one person dies in road accident every four minutes. He further informed that imparting awareness to the children shall make it a habit in them, so the efforts are to catch them young. He apprised that since drivers conductors are not giving due attention to their health on account of their tight schedule, as a result even small ailments are not timely detected which lead to major problems and sometimes also becomes a cause of accidents thereby risking their lives and the lives of the general public.
The Transport Department is organizing such camps from time to time for the benefit of the drivers/conductors, RTO added. He advised the drives to obey the traffic regulation and not to indulge in overloading in view of the high accident rate, particularly on the National highway as a number of precious lives are lost in road accidents every year. In India one accident takes place every minute and one person dies in road accident every four minutes, RTO informed. On this occasion Banners and posters on use of helmets, seat belts, avoiding over- speeding and use of mobile phones during driving and others safety measures to be taken on road were displayed.During the programme free medical checkup of over 250 drivers/conductors was conducted by the team of Medical Officers of AYUSH Kathua under the supervision of ADMO Kathua Bikram Singh Jamwal. Free medicines were also distributed on the occasion. A team of eye specialist from District Hospital Kathua also conducted free eye check up.
To educate the drivers about the procedure to be followed during any emergency, a demonstration for first responder by volunteers of Red Cross Team headed by Executive Secretary Red Cross Kathua Ashish Singh was also held for the drivers and conductors.Drivers with clean driving record were also felicitated by RTO Kathua. Among other who spoke on the occasion were ARTO Kathua, S. Yaseer Arafat, Dr Sanjeev Kumar, Dr Bodh Paul, Dr Yash Paul. Representatives of the truck union, senior drivers also spoke on the occasion and shared their experiences.