India’s roads account for 15 percent of all traffic fatalities in the world despite having only 1 percent of the motor vehicles. It’s roads have become very dangerous, with an average of one death or serious injury every minute. Today it has over 16 crore vehicles and in 2013, 137,572 people died whilst half a million were injured in road accidents. More than 50 percent of those who died are between 18 and 45 years old, leading to an estimated 3 percent loss in the nation’s gross domestic product, as per government estimates. In India, a majority of accidents occur during the day as vehicles, pedestrians, farm animals, tractors and bullock carts overloaded with goods from hay to cotton bales dodge each other on highways.
In 2013, 9,715 people were killed and 33,976 injured by iron rods and bamboo poles sticking out of the rear of trucks. Another 2,607 people were killed as a result of potholes and poor roads, according to the Accidents in India 2013 as reported by the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways. MoRTH is planning to push the new “Road Transport and Safety Bill” in the budget session of Parliament and this could raise fines for violations many fold. Running a traffic light could incur a penalty of 5,000 rupees for first-time offenders under the proposed law and 10,000 rupees for subsequent breach, versus 100 rupees now. The proposed legislation also includes standards for highway construction, pedestrian crossings, speed limits for school zones, mandatory crash tests, centralised issuance of licenses, and vehicle registration. Let us hope that things get only better as time passes. The new Bill/Act will only be a means to an end, and be the first in a journey of a thousand miles.