A writ petition was filed on Sunday, challenging the government's lack of action to enforce the laws and rules on road safety, which has resulted in frequent fatal road accidents.
The Bangladesh Bar Council's Legal Aid and Human Rights Committee's chairman ZI Khan, Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers Association, Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust and Supreme Court lawyer Abantee Nurul jointly filed the public interest litigation writ petition.
The petition was filed a day after internationally acclaimed film director Tareque Masud, who won an award at the Cannes Film Festival, ATN News' chief executive officer Ashfaque Mishuk Munier and three others were killed in a road accident at Ghior in Manikganj on Saturday.
The petition is likely to be heard today, said the petitioners.
The petition prayed for directives to be issued
to the government, asking it to investigate all fatal road accidents, and prosecute the perpetrators as well as take preventive measures to check further accidents.
The petitioners called for the concerned authorities to report to the court regularly on the steps taken by them in this regard.
They also called on the government to report to the court on the measures taken so far to investigate the fatal road accidents that occurred between 2010 and 2011.
The government should also be asked to inform the court of the measures taken by it to ensure road safety across the country, and to prevent further accidents, said the petition.
The petition also requested the court to direct the government to provide safety training for all licensed drivers to check accidents, and to disseminate information through the Bangladesh Television and Bangladesh Betar on the importance of road safety.
The petition said that the petitioners are shocked by the alarming incidence of road accidents across the country, which have been reported widely in newspapers and broadcast on the TV channels.
The petitioners are also alarmed by the failure of the authorities concerned to discharge their statutory duty to take appropriate measures to investigate road accidents, take action including prosecution against those responsible, and ensure redress to those affected.
The petitioners observed that road accidents continue to increase in frequency due to the failure of the authorities to enforce the Motor Vehicles Ordinance 1983, the Highways Act 1925, the Vehicles Act 1927, the Road Transport Corporation Ordinance 1961, the Police Act 1861 and Highway Police Rules 2005.
The failure of the government to enforce the relevant laws and rules is complete violation of the fundamental rights of persons to equality before law, life and personal liberty, which include the right to safety on the roads and highways, as guaranteed under Articles 27, 31 and 32 of the Constitution, said the petition.
Referring to the Saturday's road accident that killed Tareque Masud, Mishuk Munier and three others in Manikganj, the petitioners said they were greatly concerned to learn of the continuing and disturbingly high incidence of road crashes that result in the needless waste of lives and the destruction of families.
They also mentioned a number of fatal road accidents, including the one in which a truck packed with students crashed and flipped over into a ditch in Mirsarai upazila on July 11, killing 43 of them and injuring another 12.
The petition also referred to a report of the Accident Research Institute of the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology that has identified some 219 'black spots' on ten major highways where hundreds of fatal accidents occur every year due to flaws in the engineering and design of the road network.
The report has estimated that correction of each flaw might cost from Tk 10,000 to TK 12,000 only.
The report attributes the persistence of such fatal flaws, despite the low cost of corrective measures, to the failure to conduct regular road safety audits, for which the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority has failed to establish rules and procedures, the petition stated.
Source : New Age
