Delhi Police organises Raahgiri Day at Connaught Place

NEW DELHI: Delhi Police organised 'Raahgiri Day' at the Inner Circle of the iconic Connaught Place on Sunday. The event, organised as part of the Road Safety Week of Delhi Police, was aimed at connecting with the youth to spread awareness about road safety. "The event has been organised by Delhi Traffic Police.

The safety of commuters and passenger is the primary objective behind the event. We run campaigns and hold plays to connect with youth and spread awareness about road safety. We even came up with an analogy of road safety with (indoor board game) Ludo. We have been involving the youth and kids in our awareness campaign. Messages around road safety awareness hold a lot significance when they are diseminated by children," DCP Traffic Shashank Jaiswal told ANI on the sidelines of the event.

"It is because of such road safety initiatives that the frequency of accidents (in the national capital) has gone down. The pressure of vehicles on roads these days has increased manifold and through our campaingns, combined with innovative road enigineering, the rate of accidents has gone down in recent years. We analyse data that are used and implemented by the Road Engineering and Research Cell in road engineering and campaigns," the DCP added.

Earlier, on February 14, 'Samvedana ka Safar', a campaign spearheaded by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) under the leadership of Union Minister Nitin Gadkari, culminated in a 4-hour telethon that had a positive impact on road safety awareness.

Sharing his personal experience and highlighting the critical need for 'change', Gadkari, in a statement, said, "In our country, around 500,000 accidents occur every year and in 2022 the loss of lives stood at 168,000 with 450,000 people getting injured. While we continue to improve road and vehicular engineering, this campaign aims to foster collaboration and empathy among road users to drive behaviour change."