PUNE: Urban parents constantly worry about their children’s safety and security and probably considering it, the Regional Transport Office (RTO), Pune is planning to develop a system through Global Positioning System (GPS) where they (parents) can track school vehicles and their children.
As per the government rule, it is mandatory to install the system in all school vehicles. As many as 4,500 schools are registered in Pune and around 4,421 vehicles are registered with the RTO. Several vehicles have installed GPS while a few are still to install the system.
According to an official, RTO is planning to develop a system where the parents can easily track the vehicle. “It is too early to say, but we are planning to develop a system where the parents will be able to track the vehicle which does the pick-up and drop for the child, from home to school and back to home. We have asked schools to provide details of vehicles running under their names. Each vehicle will have a GPS system installed on it.
A group of parents will then form and the link of GPS will be provided to them so that parents can easily track their children,” said Sanjay Raut, Deputy RTO.
A district school committee meeting was held at RTO office headed by Deputy RTO Sanjay Raut. Anand Patil, Deputy RTO, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Anil Waliv, Deputy RTO, Baramati, Vijay Bajare, Inspector Traffic Police, Gautam Shewade, Office Superintendent, Zilla Parishad (Secondary School) and other officials of the education department were present.
“If a school has 10 buses and each bus carries 30 students, then the link of GPS will be sent to the parents so they can easily track the location of the bus. The system is for the safety of school children. It has been observed that parents
continuously call the bus driver and ask about the location. The GPS link will give them the exact location of the vehicle and ending their worries,” said the official.
PARKING ISSUE
The RTO has asked the traffic police to cooperate on the parking issue. “If the vehicle is parked in a ‘no parking zone’, the traffic police should provide relaxation time. We also asked them to provide wardens on selected routes for vehicles,” said Raut.
RELIEF TO PARENTS
- “Being a working parent, I cannot go to pick up my children. And this adds to my list of worries whether they reached home on time or not. But with GPS, I can track them and it will ease my worries,” said Megha Shinde.
- Megha, a mother of two, works in Pune while lives in Pimpri-Chinchwad.
VEHICLES’ DETAILS SOUGHT
During the meeting, the RTO has asked the school committee to provide the details of all vehicles till June 26. The schools can also upload details of buses, drivers, attendant, permit on a website -- schoolbussafetypune.org. The authority will conduct a workshop for school drivers about overloading. The officials also appeal to parents that they can take feedback of drivers and attendants from their children.
