Reining in fatal road accidents was believed to be an implausible thing till they were brought down by nearly 19% in 2014. And that is being repeated with a higher 27% this year!
Till the end of September this year, 85 less deaths were reported vis-a-vis the same period in 2016. While 314 persons died in road accident in Hyderabad police commissionerate jurisdiction in first nine months of 2016, the figure came down to 229 for the corresponding period in 2017.
That translates into saving 85 lives in 9 months. Senior police officers maintain that never in the past several years, the fatal accidents had come down so drastically. In fact, fatal accidents had been an embarrassing issue for the government – especially the traffic police – when they reviewed their performance at the year-end. They had to scout for answers to the poking questions of who was responsible for the ever increasing deaths on roads and what were their plans to control them. Though enforcement of helmet rule and some other measures by the traffic police helped bring down the fatal accident graph in some years, the success rate was negligible.
It was only in 2014, the fatal road accidents had witnessed a remarkable fall. From 447 deaths in 2013, the alarming figure dipped to 358. But the Hyderabad police couldn’t repeat the success the next year. In 2015, road accident deaths went up again by 6.14% compared to 2014. The spurt had continued in 2016 as well.
