New software will store all details

Hyderabad: The city police is working on a software that will store all accident related details. Ground level staff will be given tablet PCs and they will visit accident scenes and collect data.

The Hyderabad police’s software will be the first in India. It will enable police personnel to collect accident data as mandated in the Road Accident Report Form. “We are working to improve it and it will soon be made available to personnel,” said a senior police official.

After the software comes into use, staff from traffic and law and order police will visit the accident spots, collect and upload data. “Till now the data was collected only by the investigating officer from the law and order police. With this facility, any officer near the spot can collect details and upload them,” said officials.

Other senior police officials said that in addition to implementing the new process, it should be made mandatory that without all columns of the format filled, the FIR should not be issued.

“Field level officers, who are mostly constables or home guards, should be trained properly on using the application and it should be mandated that all the prescribed parameters should be filled. If it’s made just an option, the result will be nill,” they said.

Ground-level staff may not be aware of the uses of the data that they fill in the form and due to the lengthy process there is a chance that they may ignore some fields. To avoid this, clear instructions should be given to them, and only then can results be expected, said police officials.

Most accidents avoidable

Police officials say that most accidents occur due to indiscipline and 85 per cent of them can be easily avoided.

Most of the time, when an accident occurs, the priority of the police is to shift victims to a hospital or provide medical aid, due to which they are not able to record the details mandated in the Road Accident Report Form.

Even among cops there is a notion that fatal accidents occur only if a rider does not wear a helmet. But a helmet can save a person only from a head injury or shock, but other parts of the body are very much vulnerable to injuries.

In a recent fatal accident in Madhapur, the victim was wearing a helmet but a car ran over his body, leading to death. In the recent case of Ramya, in addition to the inebriated condition of the driver, the road gradient was steep and there was a sharp curve. The drunk driver lost control due to high speed and the sharp curve, which led to the death of three people.

DCP (traffic) A.V. Ranganath said collecting data using the form would help in creating a database, which could be helpful in policy making depending on the nature of incidents in specified areas.

“Incomplete data leads to inappropriate decisions. This data can be utilised for making inferences and to give complete accident analysis and measures we can take to avoid or minimise accidents,” he said.