Road safety Bill headed for Parliament session

Nearly one lakh road crash deaths in 2005, a barrage of questions...

Nearly one lakh road crash deaths in 2005, a barrage of questions in Parliament every session and the possibility of India overtaking current world leader China in terms of road accidents, have finally woken up the Ministry of Shipping, Road Transport and Highways out of its slumber. The ministry is all set to bring a Road Safety Bill as well as an amendment to the Motor Vehicles Act in the forthcoming this session of Parliament.

8220;Both the Bills will be tabled in this session. National Road Safety Bill will be a big step in addressing the increasing road accident cases in the country. Along with that, the amendments to the Motor Vehicles Act which propose to hike penalties and add strong punitive measures for traffic violations and road accidents will also be placed before Parliament. The parliamentary standing committee examining the Bill has assured us that they will soon send their recommendations to us for tabling before the House,8221; said a senior official of Ministry of Shipping, Road Transport and Highways.

The National Road Safety Bill will help institute state-level road safety boards that will look at all aspects from safe road designs, road safety database, vulnerable passengers, driver training and refresher courses and enabling of legal and financial set-up conducive for road safety. The Bill is linked with the idea of a National Road Safety Board Fund that will be created by imposing a 1 per cent cess on fuel and has been drafted keeping in mind the recommendations made by the Sundar committee on road safety in its report submitted to the ministry in February 2007.

The draft Bill has been examined by all stakeholders, including state Government officials, in a conference held late last year.

That clubbed with the amended MV Act should help check the soaring road accident cases in the country, say officials. The parliamentary standing committee has called for 8220;stringent8221; and strong 8220;deterrent8221; measures against traffic violations and accidents in their recommendations on the Motor Vehicles Act amendments.

Calling for long enough rigorous imprisonment for causing fatal accidents, issuing prohibitively high fines for violations, on-the-spot license suspension for drunken driving, the committee has likened road accidents to a 8220;disease8221; pervading the length and breadth of the country and has called for 8220;strengthened action8221;.

Secretary, Road Transport and Highways, Brahm Dutt had told The Indian Express that India had already overtaken China as per the preliminary figures complied by it. India8217;s road accident tally was the second highest in the world in 2005 at over 96,000 people killed which rose to 1.25 lakh in 2006, according to ministry sources. China, in contrast, is fast bringing down the road death cases.

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In 2005, China reported 4,50,254 road traffic accidents with 98,738 people killed. Figures for 2006 show 3,78,781 accidents with 89,455 people killed 8212; a 15.9 reduction in the number of accidents and 9.4 in number of road crash deaths.

The number of road accidents in China dropped by an annual average of 10.8 per cent for four consecutive years from 2003, despite continuous growth in the number of privately-owned cars. Road death toll dropped to 89,455 in 2006 from 104,000 in 2003.