Chennai: Minister for Road Transport & Highways and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, Nitin Gadkari has said that the government’s target is to reduce road accident deaths by 50 per cent by year 2024.
However, experts believe strong measures from both the government and road users are needed to achieve this.
Addressing virtual session on ‘Role of Corporates in Arresting Road Fatalities’ organised by FICCI, Gadkari congratulated FICCI on the announcement of Road Safety consortium ‘Safar’, based on the safe system approach and release of a white paper on road safety for the corporate world.
The Minister emphasised on the need for identification of ‘black spot’ in every state, district and city. The Minister said that the World Bank and ADB have already sanctioned a scheme by which the Government is allocating Rs.14,000 crores for states, NHAI and other stakeholders to remove black spots.
The Minister said that his Ministry is striving hard to reduce the road accident deaths by restructuring and strengthening four ‘E’ of road safety, that are, Engineering (including road and automobile engineering), Economy, Enforcement and Education. He suggested that the corporate world should carry out the independent surveys to identify the reasons behind the accidents and a report may be submitted to the Ministry.
He pointed out that 50 per cent of the road accidents are due to road engineering problems and now the government has taken special initiatives to improve the black spot.
This will greatly contribute towards the vision of ‘zero road accident’ in India.
Gadkari said that cooperation of NGOs, social organisations, universities is needed for education and awareness. The Minister announced that an independent road safety council, headed by a retired IAS officer would come into force within 15 days.