India's population-adjusted road deaths at 30-year high

Road design, better enforcement of safety norms can limit fatalities

- SACHIN P MAMPATTA

Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari has underlined the need to reduce road fatalities. The call comes at a time when India is losing more people in road accidents each year, relative to its population, than at any point since at least 1990, shows an analysis of government data for the past three decades.

There were 12.5 deaths per 100,000 population in 2023, according to the transport ministry’s Road Accidents in India 2023 report released in August. This is the highest level in the data available since 1990, compiled from earlier editions of the report.

Speaking at the Indian Roads Congress in Bhubaneswar, Odisha, on November 7, Gadkari stressed the need for better road engineering and safety measures to curb accidents, which claim more than 400 lives every day.