Three Year Old boy crushed to death by a school bus in north Delhi

A three-year-old schoolboy was crushed to death by his own school van in north Delhi’s Civil Lines area on Tuesday afternoon. 

The death has once again brought into focus the issue of unregulated school transport in Delhi-NCR. 

Though the state transport department has laid down stringent guidelines concerning school vehicles, these are rarely followed on the ground. 

Eye-witnesses said the victim, Aviral, got off his school van and was moving towards his home when the reversing vehicle hit him.
viral’s parents saw the accident from the terrace of their house and rushed the child to the hospital in the same cab. He was declared brought dead. 

Police have arrested the driver, Rahul Kumar, for causing death by negligent driving under Section 304A. 

The tragic incident has renewed the debate on the school transport system. School vans crammed with students driving recklessly are a common sight in the city. 

The Delhi government has also mandated educational institutes to keep a check on illegal cabs - but it has brought little improvement. 

“Traffic police should man the school roads during the opening n closing of the school hours,” said Ameeta Wattal, principal of Springadales school at Pusa Road. 

Wattal said her school had written a lot of letters to Delhi government and Police authorities regarding the traffic management outside the schools.

“The traffic is constantly flowing and there are no speed breakers. At the time of dispersal, the children are running around to reach out to their parents and other vehicles. The school staff cannot stand outside and organize the traffic.” 

Several teachers who Mail Today spoke with admitted that most of the cabs in their schools were operating without the required permit. Packed in overcrowded cabs, school-going children are often left to the mercy of errant drivers. 

As per the government guidelines, only drivers with five years of experience will be allowed to drive school buses and vans. Any driver who has been challaned more than twice in a calendar year on account of violations like overtaking, jumping of red light and parking regulations, will not be allowed to drive school buses. 

The guidelines also state that the drivers are required to wear a uniform of grey trousers and jacket, and must display their identity card visibly while driving the vehicles. 

The name of the owner of the vehicle must also figure in the card. 

Police claim that all the transport buses or cabs must pick up students from the premises of the school facility and drop them at a designated stop. 

School buses and cabs must display prominently that they are being used to ferry school children. All the vehicles must be equipped with a first-aid boxn and fire extinguisher, and must have provision for bag racks.

According to the police, huge traffic jams are witnessed outside all the schools in Delhi and the NCR. Despite several guidelines, they have failed to make provisions to park buses, cabs, and cars brought by parents to pick their wards. 

“We do continuous drive against errant drivers and also against those who are found recklessly driving and parking their vehicles. Schools and parents should also actively come forwards for the safety for students,” a senior officer said. 

However, school management figures claim that they alone cannot manage the traffic menace outside the school. 

“We have a few teachers and staff who manage the traffic outside the school. In Noida, the number of traffic constables are not sufficient. So as a part of our social responsibility, we help them. But there has to be a proper mechanism for the traffic management outside all the schools,” said Asha Prabhakar, principal of Bal Bharti School in Noida. 

Meanwhile, accidents continue unabated. In once such case, seven-year-old Jiya Juneja died four months back after remaining in a coma for nine days. 

Jiya was hit by a speeding van after she was allegedly dropped on the wrong side of the road by her school bus in Gurgaon on May 9. 

Jiya’s father Pankaj Juneja had accused the school of not following safety norms, and alleged that the bus that dropped Jiya had neither a conductor nor an attendant.