Skip to main content

Death on the Roads

 


India ranks first in the number of road accident deaths among all the 195 countries of the world and accounts for nearly 11 percent of the accident-related deaths in the world. Road accidents are a leading cause of death, disabilities and hospitalisation in the country. More than four lakh accidents occur every year on India’s roads. Over 150,000 people die in those accidents annually.

 

Number of accidents, deaths & Injuries: 2016-2021

Year

Accidents

Deaths

Injuries

2016

480652

150785

494624

2017

464910

147913

470975

2018

467044

151417

469418

2019

449002

151113

451361

2020

366138

131714

348279

2021

412432

153972

384448

 

India’s national highways are big killers. The highways comprise only two percent of total road networks in the country but they account for about 36 percent of deaths. State highways which constitute three percent of the road length claimed 25 percent of deaths due to accidents. The remaining 39 percent deaths occurred on the smaller roads which constitute about 95 percent of the total roads. When roads are good, they kill more people, it seems.

There are multiple causes for road accidents. These comprise human error, over-speeding, drunk driving, disregard of traffic signals and driving without license. It is generally agreed that four elements are involved in preventing road accidents. They are education, enforcement, engineering and emergency care. Education involves creating awareness among people regarding road safety practices. Enforcement is about implementing laws and regulations effectively. Engineering deals with proper road design and maintenance. Emergency care implies advanced life support systems including ambulance services.

Kerala witnesses a record number of road accidents every year. The most telling fact, perhaps, is that young adults in the age group of 18 to 40 years account for 70 percent of the road victims. By coincidence, an equal percentage of road accident deaths take place in rural areas. Among vehicle categories, two-wheelers account for the highest share in total accidents and fatalities.

A few months back, speaking at the valedictory ceremony of the state-level observance of the National Road Safety Week, which aims to drive home the point of safe driving and adherence to speed limit, the transport minister Antony Raju said, “Youth can lead the change by being responsible for their own life and that of others. This can in turn usher in a new driving culture.”

Given the country’s statistics for deaths on the roads, India does stand in need of a different driving culture.

 PS. Written for Indispire Editon 441: India ranks highest in the world on road accidents and related deaths. #RoadAccidents


Comments

  1. Yamini MacLeanJune 11, 2023 at 10:21 PM

    Hari OM
    It is true that India is also known for being one of craziest places any driver can face when in a vehicle! It does take some getting used to. In the end, every driver must take fullest responsbility for care and awareness - but it is also true that there could be improvement in road markings and enforcements... YAM xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalJune 12, 2023 at 7:10 AM

      A lot of things call for improvement, both from drivers' part and the authorities'.

      Delete
  2. CareenaJune 11, 2023 at 10:49 PM

    These statistics are dreadful! We lack in all four of these elements. And honestly? i don't see us improving anytime soon. On a lighter note, best drivers of the world probably, secretly, train in India!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalJune 12, 2023 at 7:11 AM

      Yeah, if you drive in India you can drive anywhere.

      Delete
  3. magiceyeJune 12, 2023 at 6:39 AM

    We also have animals jumping/running across the road!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anupama JoshyJuly 5, 2023 at 12:25 PM

    Driving in towns is a nightmare

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalJuly 5, 2023 at 3:34 PM

      Anywhere at all, especially with speeding bikers making their way through narrow gaps.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ayodhya: Kingdom of Sorrows

T he Sarayu carried more tears than water. Ayodhya was a sad kingdom. Dasaratha was a good king. He upheld dharma – justice and morality – as best as he could. The citizens were apparently happy. Then, one day, it all changed. One person is enough to change the destiny of a whole kingdom. Who was that one person? Some say it was Kaikeyi, one of the three official wives of Dasaratha. Some others say it was Manthara, Kaikeyi’s chief maid. Manthara was a hunchback. She was the caretaker of Kaikeyi right from the latter’s childhood; foster mother, so to say, because Kaikeyi had no mother. The absence of maternal influence can distort a girl child’s personality. With a foster mother like Manthara, the distortion can be really bad. Manthara was cunning, selfish, and morally ambiguous. A severe physical deformity can make one worse than all that. Manthara was as devious and manipulative as a woman could be in a men’s world. Add to that all the jealousy and ambition that insecure peo...
39 comments
Read more

Bharata: The Ascetic King

Bharata is disillusioned yet again. His brother, Rama the ideal man, Maryada Purushottam , is making yet another grotesque demand. Sita Devi has to prove her purity now, years after the Agni Pariksha she arranged for herself long ago in Lanka itself. Now, when she has been living for years far away from Rama with her two sons Luva and Kusha in the paternal care of no less a saint than Valmiki himself! What has happened to Rama? Bharata sits on the bank of the Sarayu with tears welling up in his eyes. Give me an answer, Sarayu, he said. Sarayu accepted Bharata’s tears too. She was used to absorbing tears. How many times has Rama come and sat upon this very same bank and wept too? Life is sorrow, Sarayu muttered to Bharata. Even if you are royal descendants of divinity itself. Rama had brought the children Luva and Kusha to Ayodhya on the day of the Ashvamedha Yagna which he was conducting in order to reaffirm his sovereignty and legitimacy over his kingdom. He didn’t know they w...
30 comments
Read more

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...
16 comments
Read more

Liberated

Fiction - parable Vijay was familiar enough with soil and the stones it turns up to realise that he had struck something rare.   It was a tiny stone, a pitch black speck not larger than the tip of his little finger. It turned up from the intestine of the earth while Vijay was digging a pit for the biogas plant. Anand, the scientist from the village, got the stone analysed in his lab and assured, “It is a rare object.   A compound of carbonic acid and magnesium.” Anand and his fellow scientists believed that it must be a fragment of a meteoroid that hit the earth millions of years ago.   “Very rare indeed,” concluded the scientist. Now, it’s plain commonsense that something that’s very rare indeed must be very valuable too. All the more so if it came from the heavens. So Vijay got the village goldsmith to set it on a gold ring.   Vijay wore the ring proudly on his ring finger. Nobody, in the village, however bothered to pay any homage to Vijay’s...
47 comments
Read more

Dharma and Destiny

  Illustration by Copilot Designer Unwavering adherence to dharma causes much suffering in the Ramayana . Dharma can mean duty, righteousness, and moral order. There are many characters in the Ramayana who stick to their dharma as best as they can and cause much pain to themselves as well as others. Dasharatha sees it as his duty as a ruler (raja-dharma) to uphold truth and justice and hence has to fulfil the promise he made to Kaikeyi and send Rama into exile in spite of the anguish it causes him and many others. Rama accepts the order following his dharma as an obedient son. Sita follows her dharma as a wife and enters the forest along with her husband. The brotherly dharma of Lakshmana makes him leave his own wife and escort Rama and Sita. It’s all not that simple, however. Which dharma makes Rama suspect Sita’s purity, later in Lanka? Which dharma makes him succumb to a societal expectation instead of upholding his personal integrity, still later in Ayodhya? “You were car...
24 comments
Read more