'Road accident death rate fell in Kerala after AI cameras started working'

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Kerala Transport Minister Antony Raju has said the road accident death rate has come down in the state after the Artificial Intelligence (AI) cameras became operational.

Raju, after an evaluation meeting of the AI cameras installed across the state as part of the 'Safe Kerala' project, addressed the press here on Friday and said 3,52,730 violations were detected by the cameras from June 5 to 8.

He said Keltron, which verifies the detections, uploaded 19,790 cases on the integrated transport monitoring system and the Motor Vehicles Department has issued challans in 10,457 violations.

"On an average, 12 road accident deaths were reported in Kerala per day, but after the installation of the AI cameras it has come down to 5-8 in the state," Raju said.

He also said seat belts will be made mandatory for the drivers and front seat passengers of heavy vehicles from September 1.

"Among the violations, 7,896 were by passengers in cars by not wearing seat belts. 6,153 were riding without helmets and 715 were cases of pillion riders without helmets," he added.

The cameras also detected violations by 56 government vehicles including VIP cars and 10 challans were issued till now, he added.

The Minister said directions were issued to Keltron to increase the infrastructure to register the violations detected into the integrated transport monitoring system including increasing the manpower.

Senior government officials took part in the meeting.

The Congress has been raising corruption charges against the "Safe Kerala" project, which aims to reduce road accidents and traffic violations in the state, since its inauguration in April.

Two months after the inauguration of the Rs 232-crore project, the cameras became operational on June 5.

The Kerala government had in 2020 entered into an agreement with Keltron for the project.

In April this year, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had inaugurated the 'Safe Kerala' project, which included installation of the AI cameras, envisaged to reduce road accidents and traffic violations in the state.