Principal Secretary Animal and Sheep Husbandry, Fisheries and Transport Departments Dr Asghar Hassan Samoon today directed the officers to ensure safety of commuters and improved mobility within the state.The Principal Secretary was speaking during a meeting to review the traffic management in connection with the Durbar move.The meeting was attended by Dr Manmohan Singh, Managing Director JKSRTC, RTO Kashmir, Additional Secretary, ARTOs of Anantnag, Kulgam and other concerned.Transport Commissioner SP Vaid, RTO Jammu, ARTO Udhampur, ARTO Ramban, Dysp Traffic Ramban and other officials participated in the meeting via video conferencing.Dr Samoon directed MD SRTC to ensure deployment of a sufficient number of buses and trucks for the smooth transition of Darbar from Srinagar to Jammu. He instructed that extra buses and trucks be kept available during the Move days besides an adequate number of cranes, mobile workshops, recovery vans, be deployed en-route along with necessary equipment and staff to meet any exigency.He also called for the deployment of additional buses and cabs for passengers who travel through train to Banihal for Jammu journey. The Principal Secretary also called for taking up the issue of repairing damaged patches on national highway particularly in Banihal-Ramban stretch with road construction companies for the smooth movement of vehicular traffic.
He also asked the RTOs of Kashmir, Jammu to ensure taxi operators don't overcharge from the passengers and called for deploying special teams of traffic and transport department at cab boarding stations besides ensuring the rate lists are pasted on every cab and bus service operating on Srinagar-Jammu highway.While saying that haphazard parking of trucks and other vehicles on the roadside along the highway adds to the traffic jams, Dr Samoon stressed on the officers to explore possibilities of parking slots near the highway."It will help us to manage the traffic smoothly and will help us in allowing traffic in a coordinated way whenever there is severe traffic jam or road is closed. The vehicles will then proceed from there on first-come, first-go basis," he told meeting.Regarding the frequent accidents on Banihal-Ramban stretch, Dr Samoon directed for taking stringent measures so that drivers don't resort to overloading and over speeding in these areas. He also called for fixing responsibility of officers under whose jurisdiction these accidents occur besides called for a detailed report on the causes of accidents.Transport Commissioner Dr Vaid called for erecting protection walls at vulnerable places on the highway to minimize the accidents. He also raised various points regarding the smooth regulation of traffic.