2015 Report: 5 lakh accidents, 1.46 lakh deaths

Nitin Gadkari, the Minister of Road Transport & Highways, has released a report named 'Road Accidents in India 2015', which mentions that the last year witnessed over 5 lakh road accidents in the country. These accidents killed a whopping 1.46 lakh people, while more than 4 lakh were left injured.

The said report was compiled by the Transport Research Wing of the Government of India. It further points to an increase of 2.5% in the total number of accidents, as compared to 2014. The increase in percentage is even worse when talking about the number of deaths, as there were 4.6% more deaths recorded than in 2014.

It's not just the number of accidents that are increasing, but their severity too is on the rise. On an average, 28.5 people lost their lives per 100 accidents in 2014, while in 2015, it rose to 29.1 fatalities per 100 mishaps.

To bring things into perspective, 2015 witnessed around 57 road accidents and 17 fatalities every hour.

Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh were the top 3 states in terms of number of road accidents, while the top 13 states (including the above 3 and Karnataka, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Telangana, Chhattisgarh, West Bengal and Haryana) cumulatively accounted for 86.7% of the total number of accidents in India.

Mumbai witnessed a total of 23,468 accidents in 2015, which is the highest number recorded across all cities of the country. However, it was Delhi which suffered the maximum number of fatalities (1,622) due to road accidents.

The Minister claimed that the Government is planning to reduce the total number of accidents by 50% by the year 2020. He also spoke about the various measures and steps that the Government is taking in order to enhance road safety and minimize deaths due to accidents. Some of the most important steps include new safety norms for automobiles, improved trauma care facilities and enhancing public awareness + responsibility.