Experts suggest spl fund for road mishap victims

Experts and rights activists have demanded creation of a special fund in the budget for the next fiscal year for payment of compensation to the road accident victims.

They also suggested imposing mandatory tax on vehicle owners in support of the fund for ensuring road safety.

Speakers said these at a pre-budget discussion - 'State-sponsored compensation for road accident victims: Allocation in national budget' - organised by Road Safety Foundation at Public Library in the city on Sunday.

Experts called for allocation in the national budget to formulate the state-run trust fund to bear the medical cost and compensation for the victims of road mishaps.

Road Safety Foundation vice-chairman Abdul Hamid Sharif underlined the need for launching 'third party insurance' like other countries to address the road safety and compensation-related issues.

Road accidents should be lodged as accident cases instead of filing 'attempt to murder' cases. In most such cases, it is difficult to get justice and compensation because of the cases' manner, he observed.

Besides, Bangladesh is not dealing the issue in line with the international standards, he added.

Experts advocated providing allocation to the proposed special fund to address the road safety issues for people's interest.

In this regard, Prof Dr. Moazzem Hossain of BUET cited the example of banking sector, where the government is injecting public money to support the sector in response to the 'failure of some people'.

Despite realising taxes from people to provide transport safety, the government is not serving vehicles owners properly through its entities like Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA), he added.

Barrister Jyotirmoy Barua presented the keynote paper on the occasion.

In his paper he urged the government to form a regulatory body with experts, and provided a set of recommendations to this effect.

The recommendations included setting up specialized hospitals for road accident victims, posting sufficient doctors to district level, organising regular trainings for drivers, monitoring road maintenances duly, and ensuring safe roads and highways.