Turning the idea of Raksha Bandhan on its head, Nizamabad TRS MP Kalvakuntla Kavitha has kicked off an appeal to the women of Telangana to gift their brothers a helmet instead of tying a rakhi for the occasion on August 7.
Launching a social media campaign called Sister4Change, Kavitha asked the women of the state to contribute to the safety of young motorists. The MP tweeted a poster for the campaign that read:
Anguished by the number of 2-wheeler accidents,I would like to make a serious effort 2 save some lives.JoinMe #Sisters4Change #GiftAHelmet pic.twitter.com/3Psl1aXmWk
— Kavitha Kalvakuntla (@RaoKavitha) July 24, 2017
“Every day, about four hundred people die in two-wheeler accidents across the country because they don’t wear a helmet. Let’s join hands for our brothers’ safety.”
Kavitha launched the campaign on Monday, on the birthday of her brother and Minister of Information and Technology KT Rama Rao.
While the traditional symbolism of Raksha Bandhan involves women tying a rakhi to their brothers to appeal for their protection, Kavitha urged that the tradition be turned around. In a media release on the campaign, she said, “It is the need of the hour to safeguard our brothers and rewrite the tradition by gifting them a helmet this Rakhi, as the numbers of deaths in two-wheeler accidents is much higher than in terrorist attacks.”
Kavitha also said that while the campaign had been launched on social media, it would be stepped up to include awareness-building events on the ground in the state too.
The campaign received widespread support from many, including shuttlers Jwala Gutta and Saina Nehwal. However, some social media users responded by asking the government to first repair the potholed roads of Hyderabad, which have been blamed for many accidents, and have worsened in condition after the recent deluge.
Hyderabad has been seeing a rising number of road accidents in the past few years. In 2016, 2271 accidents were reported in Hyderabad in 2016, with 371 people killed in these crashes. In 2017, there were already 416 road accidents reported in the city by March, with 48 people having been killed in them.