MINGORA: At least 119 people lost their lives in road accidents during the last 18 months, mostly motorcycle-related mishaps.

Owing to the large number of road accidents, the administration of Malakand division has decided to launch a comprehensive campaign against teenager motorcyclists.

The decision was taken in a meeting held here with Commissioner Riaz Khan Mehsud in the chair. The district police officer, assistant commissioners, secretary of Regional Transport Authority, traffic magistrate, excise and taxation officer, motor vehicle examiner and other officials attended the meeting.

DPO Syed Ashfar Anwar and RTA Secretary Hamid Ali said that most of the traffic accidents occurred near thickly populated towns and bazaars on highways right from Landakay to Mingora and Chakhdara to Mingora.

Admin decides to launch campaign against underage drivers

They said that 527 road accidents took place in Swat during the last one year of which 366 occurred till December last while the remaining 161 accidents took place during the previous six months. They said that 795 people were severally injured in the accidents.

The meeting was told that the main reason of increase in number of motorcycles in Swat was its provision on easy installments by the dealers.

“Most of these motorcycles are unregistered and under the use of teenagers having no valid licence. They do not adopt safety measures,” said the excise and taxation officer.

Commissioner Riaz Khan Mehsud expressed concerns over the increasing traffic accidents. He said that besides losses of precious human lives, the accidents were also causing damage to tourism industry in the area.

The meeting decided to impound unregistered vehicles soon after its recovery from roads as it had been termed main cause of incidents.

The relevant departments were asked to make the drive a success by jointly working round the clock with missionary spirit.

The meeting decided that use of helmet by the motorcyclists was essential. It was decided that filling stations would not give petrol to any motorcyclist without helmet whereas police, Levies and intelligence officials would be deputed to monitor the situation. Similarly, police and excise departments would launch joint operation against the tampered and unregistered motorcycles.

The meeting imposed complete ban on teenager motorcyclists, saying FIR would be registered against the violators as well as against their parents. It was also decided to launch awareness campaign for the purpose. The excise department was directed to accelerate the registration process and issue driving licences to the applicants within 14 days.

Published in Dawn, July 15th, 2019