Hyderabad: Traffic police which has made seat belts mandatory for co-passengers as well in Cyberabad limits and on the Outer Ring Road (ORR) has booked 3,034 cases on violators.
The traffic police has deployed teams at the toll gates to enforce the rule and book commuters who are not wearing seat belts.
DCP, traffic, Cyberabad, S.M. Vijay Kumar said these cases were booked from January 1 till September 30. The penalty ranges between Rs 100 and Rs 200.
According to the World Health Organization, wearing seat belts could have saved up to 50 per cent of front seat occupants in road accidents across the world. Failure to belt up has been a major cause for road traffic deaths and injuries amongst vehicle occupants.
Passengers who do not wear seat belts and have a frontal crash are most likely to suffer a head injury. This is followed in importance by injuries to the chest and the abdomen. Among disabling injuries, those to the leg and neck occur most frequently.
Mr K. Vinod Kumar, a road safety expert, said, “The use of seat belts and child restraints is one of the most important actions that can be taken to prevent injury in a motor vehicle crash. While seat belts and child restraints do not prevent crashes from taking place, they play a major role in reducing the severity of injury to the occupants of a vehicle involved in a collision.”
He said front seat occupants faced a 45-50 per cent risk and rear passengers 25 per cent risk of incurring serious injury in the event of a crash. Rear seat passengers who are not wearing their seat belts also represent a danger for the persons sitting in the front.
“Enforcement mechanism is really important and as per law all the occupants in the car should wear seat belts. It’s a good move by Cyberabad traffic police that they are booking cases against the other passengers apart from the driver for not wearing a seat belt.”
