Saturday, 27 Jul, 2024
Up to 23 people were hurt in the incident; four of them were sent to Raipur AIIMS with critical injuries. Image Source: IANS
The accident in Chhattisgarh has once again highlighted the rising number of road accidents in India
Ten people, including three children, died in a terrible tragedy that occurred in Chhattisgarh when a truck carrying passengers collided with a parked automobile on the highway. On Sunday, the incident happened in Bemetara. Up to 23 people were hurt in the incident; four of them were sent to Raipur AIIMS with critical injuries.
According to the officials, the victims were from Patharra village and were coming from a family function in Tiraiyya village when the goods vehicle struck a small truck that was parked on the side of the road.
With a social media post, Chief Minister Vishudeo Sai offered his condolences for the disaster and guaranteed the victims and injured of government assistance and medical care.
According to preliminary accounts, a stationary truck that was stopped by the side of the road was struck by the mini-truck. In the middle of a strong headlight flash, the driver failed to detect a stationary truck by the side of the road while trying to pass another car approaching from the opposite direction.
The accident in Chhattisgarh has once again highlighted the rising number of road accidents in India. As compared to 2020, the number of road accidents rose by 17 percent in 2021, showing a rise in the rate of deaths per 1,000 vehicles in India. During the previous year 2020, country saw an unprecedented decrease in accidents, fatalities and injuries. This was due to the unusual outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic and resultant stringent nation-wide lockdown particularly during March-April, 2020 followed by gradual unlocking and phasing out of the containment measures.
Source: Ministry of Road Transport and Highways
In 2021, around 1,53,972 people were killed in road accident cases. Around 4.12 lakh road accidents were reported - up from 3.54 lakh in 2020. Over half of all fatalities, 87,000 were caused by speeding, while 42,000 were blamed on reckless and unsafe driving. The number of people killed in car crashes has risen by 16.8 percent. (From 1,33,201 in 2020 to 1,55,622 in 2021). According to observations, the number of fatalities per 1,000 cars rose from 0.45 in 2020 to 0.53 in 2021.
During 2021 a total of 4,12,432 accidents were recorded, of which 1,42,163 (34.5 percent) were fatal accidents, 2,46,027 (59.7 percent) were injury (minor and grievous) causing accidents. Among injury causing accidents, 1,26,394 (30.6 percent) were grievous and 1,19,633 (29 percent) were minor injury causing accidents
Two-wheelers were involved in the most fatal road accidents in 2021 (69,240 fatalities), making up 44.5 percent of all deaths on the road, followed by cars (23,531 fatalities; 15.1 percent) and trucks/lorries (14,622 fatalities; 9.4 percent). The majority of two-wheeler-related killings were reported in Tamil Nadu (8,259 fatalities) and Uttar Pradesh (7,429 fatalities), accounting for 11.9 percent and 10.3 percent of all two-wheeler-related fatalities, respectively. However, there were a lot fewer accidents in 2021 as compared to 2019, when there were 4.37 lakh reported accidents and 1.54 lakh fatalities.
Two-wheelers (58,129 fatalities) contributed 43.6 percent of all fatal road accidents in 2020, followed by cars (17,538 fatalities) (13.2 percent) and trucks/lorries (16,993 fatalities) (12.8 percent). Between 2020 and 2021, Tamil Nadu reported the highest increase in the number of traffic accident cases (from 46,443 to 57,090), followed by Madhya Pradesh (from 43,360 to 49,493) and Uttar Pradesh (from 30,593 to 36,509). In 2018, around 1,52,780 people lost their lives in road accidents, out of 4,45,500 lakh accidents were reported.
In 2022, a total of 4,61,312 road accidents have been reported by States and Union Territories, which claimed 1,68,491 lives and caused injuries to 4,43,366 persons. This marks an increase of 11.9 percent in accidents, 9.4 percent in fatalities, and 15.3 percent in injuries compared to the previous year.
During 2022, a total of 4,61,312 accidents were recorded in the country, of which, 1,51,997 (32.9 percent) took place on the National Highways (NH) including Expressways, 1,06,682 (23.1 percent) on State Highways (SH) and the remaining 2,02,633 (43.9 percent) on Other Roads. Out of the total of 1,68,491 fatalities reported in 2022, 61,038 (36.2 percent) were on National Highways, 41,012 (24.3 percent) were on State Highways and 66,441 (39.4 percent) were on Other Roads. Out of the total, 1,55,781 fatal accidents reported in 2022, 55,571 (35.7 percent) were on National Highways, 37,861 (24.3 percent) were on State Highways and 62,349 (40 percent) were on Other Roads.
Amongst the States, Tamil Nadu with 64,105 accidents (13.9 percent) recorded the highest number of road accidents in 2022 followed by Madhya Pradesh (54,432 i.e., 11.8 percent). Uttar Pradesh (22,595 i.e., 13.4 percent) topped the States in respect of the number of fatalities due to road accidents followed by Tamil Nadu (17,884 i.e., 10.6 percent).
The government has been taking several steps to prevent the road accidents. One of the steps was an amendment in the Motor Vehicle Act in 2019. The Motor Vehicle Amendment Act, 2019 hikes the penalties for traffic violations, defective vehicles, juvenile driving, etc. It calls for the creation of a Motor Vehicle Accident Fund, which would require all Indian road users to carry insurance coverage for certain types of accidents.
In spite of certain measures and steps taken by the government to prevent accidents, the number of road accidents in India continue to rise every year claiming more and more number of lives.
