Around 15 persons die every day due to road mishaps: Odisha Minister

The State is grappling with an unsettling escalation in road accidents which tragically claim the lives of approximately 15 individuals each day. During a recent session in Legislative Assembly, Transport Minister Bibhuti Bhusan Jena revealed this disturbing data: the daily average of road accidents stands at 31, resulting in approximately 27 injuries.

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Despite the State government's efforts aimed at diminishing these fatal incidents, including various road safety initiatives, experts contend these programmes are largely confined to theoretical plans, limited to reviews and meetings alone.

Alarming statistics of road mishaps

Alarming statistics surfaced, showing an average of five accidents every four hours, leading to injuries, with three fatalities occurring nearly every five hours. In the past five years, the State has faced an annual average of 11,366 road accidents, injuring nearly 10,008 people and claiming around 5,433 lives.

The Transport Minister's written statement attributes the surge in accidents to the rapid increase of vehicles on the road and rampant breaches of traffic regulations. To address these issues, the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT, Chennai) has been tasked with analysing causative factors and recommending remedies.

IEMS to effectively curb reckless driving!

Notably, while an Integrated Enforcement Management System (IEMS) is being developed to effectively manage reckless driving, road safety specialists argue that the State's current road safety programmes remain restricted to dialogues at conferences and review meetings in Lok Seva Bhavan and district offices, failing to impact the grassroots effectively.

This typical scenario reveals a significant squandering of funds allocated for road safety, underscoring an urgent imperative to extend the safety strategies to broader audiences.

“We have entrusted IIT, Chennai to find ways to minimise road mishaps, reduce fatalities due to road accidents, and curb reckless driving as well. IEMS method has been devised to achieve this goal,” the Transport Minister expressed to OTV.

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“People are often driving recklessly. No provision is being made to punish them as per law, awareness campaigns are not being conducted at the ground level, and good drivers are not being created, which are leading to rising road mishaps. Crores of rupees are being spent in meetings and conferences but to no avail,” road safety expert Subrat Nanda said.