A number of schoolchildren joined cricketing legend Sachin Tendulkar to walk across a zebra crossing near the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium here to reiterate the importance of road safety and sanctity of the zebra crossing on Sunday.
Many schoolchildren later joined him at the stadium to launch “#iPledge” a movement that seeks to engage with millions of Indians to take the #ipledge on their Twitter and Facebook profiles. The initiative is a part of a vision to make roads safer, taken up as part of corporate social responsibility by Aster DM Healthcare.
The movement plans to educate and inculcate responsible road habits and behaviour among citizens by encouraging children to be the agents of change. The campaign will include activities to raise awareness about road safety rules, traffic signs, road etiquette, road markings as well as first-aid.
The “Aster SafeRoads Campaign” will actively engage with members of the public on best road safety practices.
At the event, the children were informed that according to the Union Ministry of Road Transport, one life is lost every 3.7 minutes in India due to accidents. This has resulted in annual fatalities of 1.2 million and serious injuries to over 5.5 million Indians over the last decade. Last year, 2,38,562 accident fatalities took place.
Commenting on the campaign, Sachin said he was happy to be part of the initiative being undertaken to address the grave problem of road fatalities in India and said the purpose was to reach out to school children across the country to be the custodians of the ‘iPledge’ campaign as their voices will echo with greater impact across audiences of all ages.
