Mumbai, March 13 (IANS) An annual road safety audit will be conducted on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway in view of the rising number of accidents on the 95-km-long high-speed road, a state minister announced in the state assembly here Wednesday.
Sophisticated instruments like mobile speed guns and highway surveillance systems would be deployed to check speed limit violations, currently set at 80 kmph on the expressway, Public Undertakings Minister Jaidutt Kshirsagar told the house while responding to questions raised by Bharatiya Janata Party's Sudhir Mungantiwar and other members.
Drawing the government's attention, Mungantiwar said that in the past seven years, nearly 3,500 accidents have taken place on the expressway, including 612 cases with 841 fatalities.
When Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Jitendra Awhad pointed out that world-class security systems were lacking, Kshirsagar said the new highway surveillance system would capture the picture of vehicles, number plates and drivers.
It would then be relayed to the control room for further action like levying penalties on the speed limit violators.
The new surveillance system will be installed within two months, the minister said.
Within a month, the government also plans to erect high tensile steel wire rope barriers, raise the height of road dividers, and increase the number of highway police force by 25 percent.
A proposal to widen the 12-km stretch between Kalamboli-Sinhagad Institute on the expressway is awaiting clearance of an expert committee.
Mungantiwar urged that the toll contractors must be made to pay accident compensation, to which the minister said that there was an insurance clause on the agreement with the toll contractors which would be examined.
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