States embrace tighter speed limits

After West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, is on course to formally institutionalise a new safe speed limit policy.

- Soumya Chatterjee

This shift, experts say, could be a potential game-changer as India battles the world’s highest burden of road crash deaths, caused mainly by speeding and with Uttar Pradesh consistently recording the highest number of road crash fatalities over the last four years.

The policy marks a shift from India’s longstanding practice of fixing speed limits solely by road category to context-based limits for school zones (as low as 25 kmph) and high-pedestrian areas. UP’s progress follows West Bengal, which notified new context-based speed limits across the state in January 2025 based on the same guidance.

In September 2025, the UP transport department and IIT-Kharagpur signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to design a statewide road safety action plan, with enforceable speed management guidelines at its core.

Kinjal Singh, UP state transport commissioner, said a draft policy prepared with technical guidance from IIT-Kharagpur has been circulated to all road-owning agencies and other arms of government, including the traffic police. “After incorporating the suggestions from different government departments, we will proceed towards a formal adoption of the policy, after which road-owning agencies will revise the speed limits and take up necessary action to institutionalise them,” Singh added.

Beyond reduced speed limits, the draft proposes recording all crashes on the Integrated Road Accident Database (iRAD) and analysing them against notified speed limits. It also calls for adopting a Safe System approach covering roads, vehicles, speeds and road users, with special focus on vulnerable users.

The policy further proposes identifying accident-prone spots using iRAD data, installing signage, markings and traffic calming, and deploying speed cameras and electronic monitoring for enforcement. It also envisages public awareness campaigns and a pilot project in one district before statewide rollout.