Bengaluru: An accident involving Narayana E Techno school bus which claimed the life of a pedestrian and led to minor injuries to 20 students has again raised several questions over the safety of kids inside the school vans. Questions have been raised over the way in which school managements are flouting rules to wind and compromising with the safety of children even though their parents make payment of several thousand rupees per month as transportation fee to the school.
Primary enquiry by the traffic police has revealed that school had deputed a driver who had driving experience of just a few weeks. The driver allegedly confessed that he lost control over the school van following drowsiness. But as per the Supreme Court guidelines a school van driver must possess minimum four years driving experience. Now questions are raised on how an elite school can compromise with the one of the important conditions put forth by the Supreme Court.
The SC guidelines deal extensively with safety measures in the school vans right from the van design to mandatory speed governors, seat capacity etc. But most of the schools are openly violating these guidelines leaving the students exposed to the accidents. But traffic and transport department officials who are implementing the guidelines have a different point of view.
Even after several initiatives involving the school managements, hundreds of schools in the city are still not following all the conditions leading to accidents often. “If we impose fines, managements pay the fine and continue with their old practices. There is no provision to initiate complaint against school except imposing fine and cancelling the driving license of the driver who is hired through third party. For schools, paying fine is more profitable than following the conditions,” said an officer from the transport department.
“Intensive checking drive carried out by the Transport department reveal that complaints like no fitness certificates, no First Aid Box, no insurance, violating on mandatory disclosure rules etc. We impose fine and if the violation is more such vehicles were seized. In no way does this pinch the school managements which continue with the violations,” he explained. The way forward: Many logistic experts feel that need of the hour is making the school managements responsible for the repeated violations.
“As per the data available on the public domain, schools are found violating the guidelines more often. They escape from legal scrutiny by paying just a few hundred rupees as fine. If managements were made responsible for repeated violations, they will definitely show more seriousness in implementing the guidelines,” says Mr. Raghunandan Shenoy, an expert.
Supreme Court guidelines for school vehicles:
- No such vehicle shall carry children in excess of its permitted seating capacity
- There must be a First-aid box and drinking water strictly in the vehicle
- The seat belts, wherever applicable, must be fastened properly
- School name and telephone no. must be displayed
- Every vehicle for carrying school children must be driven by a driver, who has minimum of 4 years of experience
- Mandatory speed governors
- Attendant to help the students to get in and get out of the school van
- School cabs should be fitted with speed governors with maximum speed limit of 40 kmph
- School bus body shall be in highway yellow colour and a horizontal strip in green colour of 150 mm width in the middle all around the vehicle
- The words School Cab must be prominently displayed on all four sides
- Enough space to keep school bags
- Complete list of school children with their contact details with the crew member
No strong deterrent: All violate, all go scot-free
When it comes to the violation of the Supreme Court guidelines, there is very little difference between elite and budget schools. Documents released by the state transport department reveal that many top ranked schools of the city were found violating the guidelines and fined.
According to the data available between April 1, 2014 and June 30, 2015, 849 cases were registered against 66 schools across the state. Among these 66 schools 34 schools are from Bengaluru alone.
According to the documents, 85 cases of violations were registered on Ryan International School of the city alone, followed by 76 cases against Delhi Public School (DPS). Other prominent schools found violating the guidelines were Presidency School (28), Vibgyor (23), CM National School (24), Ravishankar Vidya Mandir (43), Venkat International School (63), Kumaran’s Children’s School (33), Bishop Cotton (35), Global School (12) etc.
“These are only a few schools. Traffic and transport department officials are penalising school vans on daily basis which are found violating the rules,” explained a traffic police official. Very little impact: Authorities feel that in the absence of stringent punishment provisions, schools continue to violate the guidelines. “Fine amount is very less compared to the cost involved in following the guidelines. Seating capacity is compromised irrespective of the school’s status. Except few international schools majority of the schools are yet to install GPS and other security instruments, first aid box etc,” he explained.
But school managements have a different point of view. According to principal of a private school, they are caught between the devil and deep blue sea. “Implementing all the safety guidelines need investment beside high operational costs. But we have to incur the wrath of parents if we increase transport fee. Even the transport fee fixed by the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) is very nominal compare to actual costs,” he explained.
“A few schools hire BMTC buses. But those buses also do not follow any of the guidelines of the Supreme Court. Recently transport department registered cases against few BMTC buses also. So need of the hour is parents should join hands with managements before blaming the schools for every thing,” he argues.
