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Vehicle drivers in Pune need to think before they decide to jump the signal next time or bang into another vehicle due to callous driving behaviour. In a bid to keep vehicle drivers from violating traffic rules, Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) will be sharing traffic violation data with insurance companies.
Through this, insurance players will be able to understand if the accident has happened due to any kind of violation of traffic rules. In such a case, claim for compensation from insurance players may become difficult for vehicle owners.
Pune will be the first city in the country to implement it. The cost of this project is Rs 15.4 crore. This project will be operational within the next three months.
Vehicular data will be collected through PMC's Intelligent Transportation
System (ITS), which will then beshared with insurance companies. "We will talk to insurance players and present our proposition to them. It will be a win-win situation for both. This data we will be shared for a cost agreeable to both the parties," said Shriniwas Bonala,additional city engineer (traffic planning), PMC.
Signal jumping and speed violation are the major problems in the city and unless the citizens observe the traffic rules, the problem cannot be solved, said PMC officials.
The ITS project will work on six different components and collect data on these parameters like comprising critical place surveillance, red light violation, speed limit violation, area traffic control,passenger information and garbage/octroi vehicle management.
Often vehicle drivers jump signals, over-speed, do not follow lane discipline and do not maintain safe distance between vehicles resulting in road mishaps. In such situations, vehicle owners claim for compensation from insurance companies, which they will not find easy to get anymore.
"We welcome this move. This is a good initiative. It will be essential that driver specific data is shared and notonly vehicle related information," said Tapan Singhel, CEO of Bajaj Allianz General Insurance.
The motive of implementing ITS is to educate the citizens about traffic rules. The project will involve monitoring and maintaining the ITS, and sending notices to traffic violators and if they fail to pay the fine, the PMC will take legal action against them.
"The data will also be shared with the city police as they have the traffi-cop system to identify violators. Even the Union Government is planning to have a national vehicle registration system in place. When that happens, we will be able to identify vehicle owners from other parts of the state and the country," added Bonala.
To begin with, vehicles registered with the Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad regional transport offices (RTOs) will be detected as PMC has access to data from these two RTOs. "The RTO data will be updated within the next couple of months and after the General Body approves the project, the PMC will educate citizens about ITS," Bonala added. There are 2.4 million registered vehicles in Pune city out of which 18 lakh are two wheelers.
