BENGALURU: Various road safety organizations across the country, on Sunday, urged the Union Government to push the amendment to the Motor Vehicles Act in order to increase safety on the country’s roads and highways. On the occasion of World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims, the national coalition of NGOs working on road safety in India, highlighted alarming figures which show that 413 lives are lost in road crashes everyday across India.
The Motor Vehicles (Amendment) bill 2017 has already been passed by the Lok Sabha and is pending for clearance by the Rajya Sabha. Karnataka, in 2016, was ranked third in road crash cases and fourth in fatalities from road crashes with 11,133 deaths and 44,403 cases recorded in 2016 itself. The state has seen an increase in the severity of road crashes with the figure for persons killed per 100 accidents standing at 25.1 in 2016, higher than 22.8 in 2013.
“The figures reveal how road crashes continue to remain a pandemic for our country, killing over 400 people each day. Since 2007, road crash deaths nationally have increased by an astounding 31% and Karnataka is the state with the third highest number of road crash cases and injuries and fourth highest in road crash deaths in India. The need of the hour is a strong legal framework combined with a campaign at the level of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan. We need the Rajya Sabha to pass the Motor Vehicle (Amendment) Bill 2017 urgently and the Government of Karnataka to support the Bill,” said Piyush Tewari, founder of SaveLIFE foundation, a non-profit organisation working in the road safety sector.
The World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims is observed on the third Sunday of November every year and is dedicated to commemorate people who were killed or injured in road accidents across the world.