Dehradun:
Dehradun is staring at a full-blown traffic tsunami. With 13.4 lakh registered vehicles and a 34% drop in dedicated traffic police personnel over eight years, managing traffic is fast slipping out of control.
Dehradun-based social activist Anoop Nautiyal has written to Deepam Seth, Director General of Police, Uttarakhand, calling for an urgent Citizen Partnership Model to prevent a complete traffic collapse in the state capital.
Nautiyal flags a stark mismatch: traffic police strength in Dehradun has fallen from 411 in 2017 to just 269 now, even as vehicles have surged. RTI data shows 36% of all vehicles in Uttarakhand are registered in Dehradun district alone. That means one traffic cop for nearly 5,000 vehicles.
“This is no longer an inconvenience — it’s a governance failure,” Nautiyal warns, pointing to gridlocks choking emergency services, worsening mental stress, fuel wastage, pollution and a damaging impact on Uttarakhand’s tourism image.
With the Char Dham Yatra and peak tourist season approaching, he proposes a supervised volunteer force — ‘Uttarakhand Traffic Sarthi’ — where trained citizens assist traffic police at critical junctions during peak months. The volunteers would work strictly under police command, acting as force multipliers, not replacements.
Nautiyal has also appealed to Pushkar Singh Dhami to personally intervene, review the crisis, and immediately strengthen Uttarakhand Police with manpower, tools and institutional backing.
“Expecting the police to manage exploding traffic, VIP movements and mass tourism with shrinking resources is unfair and unsustainable,” he said, adding that he himself is ready to volunteer during summer 2026.
The sixpaged letter asserts that without citizen partnership and immediate police strengthening, Dehradun’s traffic will spiral beyond control.
The ball is now firmly in the Chief Minister’s court.
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