RAJ KUMAR
Ranchi, Dec.30: The standout wicketkeeper of Indian cricket team Rishabh Pant, sustained injuries in the road accident near Roorkee in Uttarakhand today. Former Tata Sons chairman Cyrus Mistry died in an accident on September 4 this year at Palghar in Maharashtra.
They are not only two. There are several like them across the country who became victims of road accidents.
As many as 1.73 lakh people lost their lives in around 4.22 lakh traffic accidents in the country in 2021 with Uttar Pradesh reporting the highest number of deaths in such mishaps at 24,711 deaths, followed by Tamil Nadu which recorded 16,685 deaths.
According to the latest report of the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), the number of traffic accidents in the country increased from 3, 68,828 in 2020 to 4,22,659 in 2021.
These traffic accidents comprise 4, 03,116 road accidents, 17,993 railway accidents and 1,550 railway crossing accidents. They caused 1, 55,622, 16,431 and 1,807 deaths respectively during 2021.
Officials of the Road Safety Cell confirmed the figure sharing the latest figure of Jharkhand’s capital, where post of traffic SP is vacant for more than a year while traffic load multiplied by at least 10 times since creation of Jharkhand.
“From January to November this year as many as 621 road accidents occurred in Ranchi. In these accidents the number of fatalities remained 406 while the injury figure remained 414,” an official of the Road Safety Cell said, sharing data.
The data suggests that the maximum accident occurred in November in which 46 died while 50 sustained injuries while the minimum 46 accidents occurred in February claiming lives of 32 people and leaving 17 injured. In Ranchi last year a total of 448 people died and 339 were seriously injured in 644 road accidents.
Prabhakar, an government accredited Jharkhand Andolankari, said putting a check on accidents has become difficult as vehicles having capacity to run at a high speed and number of roads allowing vehicles to run at a high speed has increased with limited arrangement to regulate the speed.
“Our scripture suggests that one should cover way with patience, sew sheets slowly, climb the mountain gradually, learn anything patiently and earn money slowly but violation in this rule is being seen everywhere and this is resulting in accidents in every walk of life,” he said.
“Shanaih Panthah Shanaih Kanthah Shanaih Parvatlanganam, Shanairvidya Shanairvittam Panchtani Shanaih Shanaih,” Prabhakar quoted
A police official supported Prabhakar saying accident often put police in trouble and from registering cases in different sections included sections 304(A) (causing death by rash and negligent act), 279 (rash driving on a public road) and 337 (causing death by act endangering life and personal safety of others) of IPC besides the Motor Vehicles Act police have to take care of rescue in case of any accident.
“When police become strict, pressure starts coming from different sides to become lenient. Apart from this, all police officials are not honest enough to implement provision of MV Act properly which provides use of seat belt while driving four wheelers, helmet while using two wheelers, regulating the speed besides according to place and situation,” the police official said.
