India loses $20bn annually to road accidents

NEW DELHI: India loses $20 billion due to road accidents annually, which the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates is enough to feed 50% of the nation's malnourished children. Officially, at least 1.34 lakh people died on Indian roads in 2010, while experts claim the figure could be about 1.5 lakh considering the under reporting of such cases.

WHO representative in India Dr Nata Menabde while addressing international road safety experts, including the senior IPS officers at a convention held at College of Traffic Management (CTM) in Faridabad, said that there is a dire need to save the vulnerable road users to reduce the huge annual financial loss. She urged that strategies have to be devised to save lives, particularly pedestrians, cyclists and two-wheeler riders besides putting curbs on drunk driving and stricter enforcement of wearing of helmets and seat belts.

"We need to see how we build our road, investigate properly how accidents occur and police probe these cases. There should be one group or body that should bring all sectors together, and it should announce a plan to reduce fatalities," Menabde said.

Highlighting how road accidents and fatalities have never grabbed attention, ex-home secretary G K PIllai said while 2,000 people dying annually in terrorist acts become a national issue, 1.34 lakh road fatalities have never been highlighted.

International experts felt that the high use of cellphones while driving is increasing the chance of accidents globally. "The chance of accidents increase four-fold in such cases," said Adam Briggs, former chief constable of the UK.

CTM president Rohit Baluja said that to reduce the accidents and fatalities on Indian roads, there is a need to have proper probe to unearth the cause of accidents. "The government data claims that only 1% of the deaths are caused due to faulty roads, which is unacceptable. When you have wrong data, how can you prepare an action plan to fix the problems? How many engineers have been jailed for any accident?" he asked.

Even senior traffic officials from Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Haryana, Rajasthan admitted that the investigators looking into accident cases have little training to probe them. "The usual course of investigation is on predictable lines: bigger vehicle is the culprit, dead is the victim and alive is the accused. We need to find the reasons behind such accidents as it is done in other countries," said Vivek Phansalkar, joint commissioner of Mumbai Traffic Police.