Bhopal: The Supreme Court Committee on Road Safety has asked the Madhya Pradesh government to control the road accidents in the state. The growth in the accidents has been recorded at more than 23% in the last five years.
Chairman of the committee Former Justice of Supreme Court Abhay Manohar Sapre had held a meeting with officers of the government of Madhya Pradesh through Video Conferencing on October 19th.
The ADG PTRI, DC Sagar informed that after the meeting recently the Committee shared the road accident finding of the state. In last five years the accident percentage had increased to 23.82%. In the year 2014, 8569 people had died in accidents which have increased to 11249 in the year 2019.
Even during January to June 2020, fatalities have decreased by 24.4% from 6234 to 4716 as compared to the corresponding period of 2019, mainly due to Lockdown.
During Lockdown period (March 24 to May 31) the fatalities decreased by 58.8% from 2551 to 1050 when compared to the same period in 2019.
The concern was expressed that more than 80% fatalities in State have occurred due to over speeding.
It was observed that the state government should have done more efforts to reduce the fatalities and taken this task as a mission for becoming an ideal State to be emulated by other States.
The Committee instructed that the state should continue to take action on their direction given earlier particularly those relating to identifications of all road segments most prone to accident, conducting third party audit, implementation of recommendation of audit, installation of street lights on-road segments vulnerable during darkness on national highways state highways and particularly in road areas, maintenance, repairs and replacement or bridges and crash barriers, ensuring adequate availability of equipped ambulances and trauma care facilities and mapping them.
The committee desired that the progress of implementation should be reviewed once a month at a senior level preferably at the level of Chief Secretary.
The ADG informed that the state has established on Driver Test Track and on Automated Vehicle Testing and Certificate Centre which are operational with one more to be made operational in Bhopal shortly.
It was observed that state government proposes to establish Computerised Driving Test Centres in all the Districts /RTOs of the State which will be completed by January, 2021.
The ADG informed that the Committee has suggested that the Road Safety Fund should made Non-Lapsable and should be notified in the Gazette of the state government. The state should beef up Highway Patrolling along all Accident Prone stretches of the National and State Highways in the state as about 54% fatalities accrued on NH & SH of the total road fatalities in State in year 2018.
Stern action against minor drivers and their guardians/owners vehicles should be taken as per Motor Vehicle (Amendment) Act, 2019.
