February 4, 2022
Nadimul Haque makes a Zero Hour mention on road accident deaths in the country
FULL TRANSCRIPT
According to WHO estimates, 11 per cent of all global deaths are caused by road accidents. India occupies the third position, just behind the USA and Russia, as the country with the most number of fatalities resulting from road accidents, according to the World Road Statistics Report. Close to 50 per cent of all accidental deaths in India each year are from road accidents. Even during the pandemic, with lesser vehicles on roads, there were numerous reports of tragic road accidents. This has heightened the need to reassess the National Road Safety Policy (NRSP), 2010. Although NRSP had some ambitious goals, none of them has been adequately achieved even after 11 years.
In the last five pre-pandemic years, the country has reported close to 1.5 lakh road accident deaths each year. If we include railway accidents, the figure comes up to 1.8 lakh per year. In addition to these, road accidents also cause grievous injury leading to disability and severe socio-economic distress. In 2018, India lost 0.77 per cent of its GDP due to the economic duress caused by road accidents. Studies show that the implementation of the Motor Vehicles Act and the Central Motor Vehicles Rules have been negligent. Reportedly, most road accidents occur between 6 and 9 pm and on national and state highways. National highways constitute less than 2 per cent of the total road length but account for 30 per cent of the road accident deaths, and state highways, which constitute close to 3 per cent, account for 25 per cent of all road accident deaths. It may be inferred from these statistics that there has been a clear case of poor implementation of all initiatives aimed at road safety, starting from design and construction of road infrastructure to enforcement of traffic rules to creation of awareness on road safety.
In 2020, India had pledged to reduce the number of road accidents in the country by 50 per cent by the year 2030. Hence, the fact that the fatalities from road accidents have not decreased is concerning. It has therefore become even more imperative to critically examine the flaws in the current framework and adopt measures to ensure effective enforcement. It is only with the right mix of proper laws, effective enforcement, enabling infrastructure and informed citizens that we can address an issue as crucial as road safety.
