Close to a year since it was announced that a new legislation would replace the current Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, there is no timeline on the introduction of the Road Transport and Safety Bill, 2014.
According to Piyush Tewari, CEO, Save Life Foundation, an organisation working towards improving road safety in the country, the draft Bill has been considerably diluted since it was first brought out last September. “The first two versions of the Bill were comprehensive and stringent. For the first time in the country, a National Road Safety Authority was to be established for minimum safety standards for roads, road users and vehicles; there were hefty fines for violations of rules and companies laying roads as well as the automobile industry would have to follow strict safety regulations. But there was a lot of opposition to the Bill from States and other stakeholders,” he said.
In January this year, a third version was released with rationalised penalties and some revisions on the powers of the proposed National Authority, said Mr. Tewari. “The States still opposed this. In February, the Ministry came out with a fourth version of the Bill that is almost toothless: the powers of the National Authority have been significantly diluted, penalties have been drastically reduced and a cap of Rs.15 lakh has been put on the amount of compensation a road accident victim’s family can receive,” he said.
The Bill in its present form is disastrous, said Mr. Tewari, and is weaker than the Motor Vehicles Act. “At least under the Act, a tribunal decided on the amount of compensation a victim’s family was entitled to. Under this version of the Bill, even that has been taken away. Some fines have been cut down by 90 per cent. What started off as a road safety exercise has turned into a farce,” he said, alleging that automobile industries had put pressure on State governments to oppose the Bill.
