Chandigarh, November 3: Every day, the journey has ended before the destination for, on an average, 12 persons in Punjab during 2017. Over-speeding emerged as the leading cause for deaths on Punjab roads, while whopping 75 percent of the people dying in fatal road accidents were from the age group of 18 to 45.
The startling facts were brought to fore in the latest study, ‘Report on Punjab Road Accidents and Traffic-2017’, released by the state Director General of Police (DGP) Suresh Arora on Friday. The report, compiled by the state ADGP Traffic Dr Sharad Satya Chauhan and the state Traffic Advisor Navdeep Asija, gives in detail the road safety scenario in Punjab.
The duo has compiled the details of road accidents and traffic projections in the state for the second consecutive year.
“The Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highway (MoRTH) releases such a booklet at the national level annually but Punjab compiles its traffic situation separately to analyze road safety arrangements. Even the Supreme Court Committee, for monitoring road safety, has also appreciated this fact,” said the Punjab police spokesperson.
Spokesperson said that the report would be circulated to all Deputy Commissioners, Commissioners of Police, and the Senior Superintendents of Police to analyze road safety and accident scenario in their respective areas of jurisdiction and take remedial steps to reduce accidents and deaths on road.
In addition, the copy of the e-book would also be uploaded on the website of the Punjab Police to make it available for the public, students, researchers etc for use of data at their end.
Giving details about the book, Dr Sharad Chauhan said that last year, on an average, 12 people lost their lives daily in road accidents in Punjab.
“Sharpest decline of 12.1 percent road fatalities observed in the state last year against the rising trend of previous years. This is the sharpest yearly decline achieved by the state of Punjab in this decade,” he added.
Dr Chauhan revealed that 2.25 percent of the total country’s population of lives in Punjab but its share in the total road accident deaths was varying from 3.3 to 3.5 percent of road accident deaths of India in the last five years.
About 60-67 percent of the total road fatalities occurred on national and state highways, both comprises of 5.4 percent of the total road length in Punjab.
City-wise, five cities of Punjab — Ludhiana, Patiala, Sri Amritsar Sahib, Bathinda, Mohali, and Jalandhar — alone contributed 15 percent deaths to the total road fatalities in Punjab, he added.
He said that the number of fatalities per million population of Punjab was 148, against the national average of 119.
Punjab’s three districts — Rupnagar, SAS Nagar and Fatehgarh Sahib — ranked number 1, 2 and 3, respectively where the rate of fatal road accidental deaths was almost double than the state’s average.
In 2017, out of 22, all 18 districts reported a decrease in road fatalities except Rupnagar, SAS Nagar, Fazilka and Tarn Taran. Continuous decline in road fatalities was observed in all 12 months of the year 2017, as compared with the previous year 2016, he added.
Dr Chauhan informed that as per the report, over speeding was the leading cause of deaths in Punjab. In 2017, a total 2,363 people died in road accidents due to over speeding.
Age-wise, 75 percent of the people involved in various fatal road accidents, were from the age group of 18 to 45. Road accident is one of the leading causes of young people deaths in Punjab, he added.
As per the data available, motor vehicles are growing at nine to 10 percent rate in Punjab and last year on an average, daily 300 new cars and 1700 two-wheelers were registered in Punjab. The total cumulative registered vehicle in Punjab till March 2017 were 98,59,742.
At the same time in 2017, neighbouring state Haryana recorded with an increase of 3.5 percent in road fatalities and Rajasthan with almost negligible change of minus-0.2 percent.
Source Daily Pioneer
