Muskaan Foundation for Road Safety, a twice National Award winner from the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) India is on a mission to build the capacity of Police Personnel in the country. Ensuring road safety and reduction of road crashes require a comprehensive understanding of traffic legislation. Yet, this domain often suffers from neglect as very few enforcement personnel are familiar with them. Muskaan Foundation’s ongoing mission is to work for building the capacity of Police all over India to bridge the gap between legislation, and its practical application and have an effective Road Safety Management System in place.

During the Pre and Post Assessments in eight states covering all 5,000 police personnel, it emerged that the enforcement officers were grossly unfamiliar with legislation. For example, Section 198 A of the Motor Vehicle Amendment Act is related to the accountability of faulty engineering in road crashes and mentions a certain penalty, The Pre and post-surveys during the workshops showed 89 % of personnel did not know this section. Significantly 99% of the trainees were not well versed with the relevant provision of section 184 of the Motor Vehicle Act 2019 that deals with dangerous driving.

In the module of the three-day and one-day workshops, the Police Personnel are given detailed knowledge of Traffic Engineering and Legislation, Crash Investigation with Black Spot Rectification, and Knowledge of Traffic Control Devices. Still another important topic covered during the Training is Trauma Response as Police Personnel are the first responders mostly. Along with theory, practical exposure is provided during the workshop and the trainees are taken on sight to explain Accident Analysis and Black Spot Rectification.

In commensurate with the job profile of the trainees, the workshops focus on road safety management, for varied categories of officers like Deputy Superintendent of Police, Inspectors, Sub-inspectors, and Traffic Police Personnel like Head Constable and Constables. So far the ongoing Capacity Building Workshops have covered eight states that are Punjab, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Haryana, and Odisha in the country. The Trainers’ Team consists of Muskaan’s Director Projects and Training Ms. Neha Khullar, Assistant Professor Er. Anirudh Mathur, Senior Trainers Sameer Nainawat, and Rajesh Meena.  

All the workshops were inaugurated by senior Police Officials of the states and certificates were distributed to the trainees on the culmination of the Workshops.