By Menahill Rashid
FAISALABAD. National Highways & Motorway Police (NH&MP) has started issuing international driving permits which are acceptable in 57 different countries, said Beat Commander Motorway Police Mr. Iftikhar Ali Wince.
Addressing a function in Faisalabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry (FCCI), he said that society has to play its proactive role to make road travel safe and secure. In this connection NHMP has been regularly organizing road safety seminars to sensitize the different segments of society.
He said that NHMP has convinced the education department to include road safety as an integral part of our curriculum. “It will help youth to understand and practice road safety rules in their practical life by emulating the road safety culture of the west. About his visit to FCCI, he said that he intends to organize an awareness session at a larger scale for which FCCI has to play its important and productive role. He said that the officials of NHMP will give a comprehensive briefing through multimedia while printed material about road safety would also be distributed among its participants. Responding to a question about a toll plaza established right in the middle of the road near Pindi-Bhattian, he said that three/three lanes have been added to facilitate the travelers.
He further said that the contract of M2 and M3 is expected to be allotted to the Frontier Work Organization (FWO) and this toll plaza will be removed after two months.
Chaudhary Talat Mahmood Senior Vice President FCCI welcomed the participants of the meeting and assured that it will extend full cooperation for the proposed awareness session on road safety.
He said that due to the ignorance of the drivers, their lives remain at stake while they are also a potential threat for the others. He said that in order to cultivate road safety culture in our society, we must include it in our syllabus.
He also presented a comparative study of road-safety sense in Pakistan and other developed countries and said that even our educated youth lack road sense and hence we must regularly arrange awareness sessions for them.
Khawaja Shahid Razzaq Sikka President Anjuman-e-Tajiran Faisalabad City expressed deep interest in road safety and said that he has already published a booklet on road safety which was widely circulated among the public.
He said that realizing his moral obligation, he is regularly cooperating with the local traffic police. He said that he had imported a road marking machine which could mark a 15-20 Kilometer stretch of road in an hour.
“These machines were used for road marking in different projects of National Highway Authority (NHA), National Logistic Cell (NLC) and Faisalabad Industrial Estate Development & Management Company (FIEDMC)”, he said and added that however now he is contemplating to shift these to Qatar.
He also urged the NHMP to launch a portal for the immediate redressal of complaints filed by the regular travelers. He also assured full cooperation in organizing road safety seminars in different cities of Pakistan, adding that Anjuman-e-Tajiran will bear all its expenses.
Rehan Naseem Bharara Chairman Faisalabad Garment City expressed concern over the marked difference between the efficiency of motorway and local traffic police. He said that our attitude all together changed while leaving the motorways. He said that the same spirit, zeal and incentives may be provided to the local traffic police to bring a qualitative improvement in the attitude of local traffic police.
Jaffar Ali Inspector explained in detail the road language and Flower formula to ensure safe journey on the motorways.
Rana Ikramullah, Sana Ullah Niazi and students from the city school also participated in a question-answer session.
Later, Vice President Ayub Aslam Manj offered vote of thanks, while Senior Vice President Chaudhary Talat Mahmood along with Khawaja Shahid Razzaq Sikka presented FCCI shield to Mr. Iftikhar Ali Wince. Both sides also exchanged gift hampers.
