Bhubaneswar: For effective implementation of traffic rules and to reduce road fatalities, the Odisha government has decided to create a road safety commissionerate.
“An officer in the rank of IGP is to be posted to function as road safety commissioner,” the official proceeding of a meeting chaired by Chief Secretary Suresh Chandra Mohapatra read.
The commissionerate will function under the administrative control of the Commerce and Transport Department.
Besides, representatives of transport, home, health, excise, works, school and mass education departments and National Highway Authorities have been tasked to draft strategies to bring down road accidents and fatalities.
Meanwhile, district collectors have been asked to install CCTV cameras along accident-prone stretches and blackspots on the highways. They have been asked to install these out of the district mineral fund or rope in companies for corporate social responsibility funds.
Altogether 4738 deaths were reported in the state last year with the highest of 365 in Sundargarh.