Road safety in India remains a concern as fatalities rise by 9% on-year in 2022

Road Safety

As many as 1,68,491 people died in India due to road accidents in 2022, marking a 9.4 percent rise when compared to 2021, as questions about road safety remain in the country, despite the best efforts of the government to make Indian roads safer.

The Annual Report on ‘Road Accidents in India-2022” published by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways on October 31, shows that 4,61,312 road accidents occurred in the country in 2022, which was nearly 12 percent higher when compared to 2021, a year that was impacted by partial lockdowns and traffic restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Injuries on account of road accidents also increased by 15.3 percent in 2022 compared to the previous year with 443,366 people being wounded.

These figures translate, on average, into 1,264 accidents and 462 deaths every day or 53 accidents and 19 deaths every hour in the country.

The Road Accidents in India-2022 report is based on the data/information received from police departments of States/UTs on a calendar year basis in standardised formats as provided by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) under the Asia Pacific Road Accident Data (APRAD) base project.

When compared to the pre-pandemic year of 2019, road accidents in India increased by 2.75 percent, fatalities rose by 11.5 percent and injuries on account of road accidents fell by 1.8 percent in 2022.

The rise in road accidents and fatalities due to road accidents in India seen in 2022 reinforces the perception that the quality of Indian infrastructure is inferior compared to global standards and that Indian citizens do not adhere to traffic rules.

As part of Moneycontrol’s In Bad Shape series, we reported that while India typically follows globally accepted standards, the current framework allows for gaps and overlaps in standards.

While the government is considering many steps like getting road project consultants to sign ‘Integrity Pacts’ and creating a dedicated cadre for agencies such as the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and National Highways & Infrastructure Development Corporation (NHIDCL), road safety continues to remain a cause for concern in the country.

Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari told Moneycontrol in an exclusive interview last month that he believes efforts to reduce road accidents in India and curtail casualties will not bear fruit unless citizens adhere to traffic rules and make behavioural changes.

"Frankly speaking, we are not satisfied, (and are not) seeing a fall in accidents because we need to change human behaviour," Gadkari had said.

He added that passengers need to start following traffic signals, cut down on speaking on their phones while driving, and not drive on the wrong side of the road.

The Union Minister had earlier said that the government aims to reduce the number of road accidents in India by 50 percent by next year.

The minister had earlier said that the government is spending Rs 40,000 crore for removing black spots, or accident-prone sites, on Indian roads.

According to the 'Road accidents in India -- 2022' report, 32.9 percent of accidents took place on national highways including expressways, 23.1 percent on state highways, and the remaining 43.9 percent on other roads.

Out of the total of 1,68,491 fatalities reported in 2022, 36.2 percent were on national highways, 24.3 percent were on state highways and the remaining 39.4 percent were on other roads.

Road accident severity — measured by the number of persons killed per 100 accidents — slightly decreased to 36.5 in 2022 from 37.3 in 2021.

Uttar Pradesh continued to account for the largest share of fatalities at 13.4 percent, followed by Tamil Nadu with 10.6 percent, Maharashtra with 9 percent, Madhya Pradesh with 8 percent, and Karnataka with 6.9 percent.

An analysis of the age profile of fatal road accident victims reveals that young people in the age group of 18-45 years accounted for 66.5 percent of victims in 2022, a trend similar to 2021.

Similarly, the gender-wise comparison of road accident deaths for the year 2022 reveals a disproportionately large number of male victims around 86.2 percent, compared to 13.8 percent female victims.

Speeding, riding without a helmet, drunken driving or wrong-side driving are some of the key traffic violations that lead to most of the road accidents in India.

Road accidents attributable to various types of traffic rules violations reveal that speeding continues to be the main violation associated with accidents, fatalities, and injuries, in India.

During 2022, speeding accounted for 72.3 percent of total road accidents, 71.2 percent of total deaths, and 72.8 percent of total injuries.

The number of accidents, fatalities, and injuries due to speeding increased by 12.8 percent, 11.8 percent, and 15.2 percent respectively in 2022 when compared to 2021.

Driving on the wrong side was the second highest cause of total road accidents during 2022 accounting for a 4.9 percent share.