Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Monday responded to jibes from the Bharatiya Janata Party, saying that more than the number of wheels on a vehicle, what mattered was the person driving it. The BJP had likened the three-party Maha Vikas Aghadi government to an unstable autorickshaw.
“More than whether a vehicle is a three-wheeler or four-wheeler, what is important is the person driving it. He is the one in control, as it is the steering wheel that controls all the wheels of the vehicle,” Mr. Thackeray said at the inauguration of the 31st Road Safety Week.
He said it was fine if his government was called a three-wheeler, as it was balanced and running well.
Speaking on road safety, Mr. Thackeray expressed concern over the number of fatalities in road accidents and said the country had regressed on that front compared to China. He said in 2005, there had been 94,000 and 98,000 accidents in China and India respectively. Today, however, China has brought the number down to 45,000, while in India it has soared to nearly 1.5 lakh.
State Transport Minister Anil Parab said 12,556 people died in road accidents in Maharashtra in 2019, which was still a large number though it was 5.2% lower than the 2018 figure. In all, the number of road accidents fell by 8% from 2018 to 2019. “We will undertake programmes to ensure we reduce the number by 10% this year. We will work to achieve the target of zero accidents,” he said.
Satej Patil, Minister of State for Transport and Home, suggested the government provide a dedicated fund to civic bodies for traffic signals. He said the Transport Department should be taken into confidence while drafting the development control rules.
The district road safety committees of Thane, Washim and Raigad were felicitated during the ceremony for reducing road accident fatalities by more than 20%.
