Road Safety in Delhi: A Critical Analysis of the Role of Public Institutions

Road accident is one of the major man made tragedies, killing millions of people across the world every year. The situation is quite alarming in the developing countries, experiencing increasing motorisation, without adequate institutional mechanism to combat the problem. Even within these developing countries, the vulnerable road users comprising pedestrians, bicyclists and two-wheeler riders are the worst affected. Experiences of some of the successful countries in improving road safety have shown that the road accidents are preventable to an extent, subject to concerted efforts by the government at the highest level. It is also necessary to bring all stakeholders on board to carry out the task effectively. Situation in case of India is quite grim, where more than 100,000 people are killed and many more get seriously injured in these accidents every year. In Delhi, the Capital city of India, though there has been some declining trend in the number of fatalities on account of these accidents during the last three years, the situation is far from satisfactory. There is an urgent need to take necessary steps for improving road safety environment of the city. For this purpose, necessary institutional mechanisms need to be evolved by bringing major stakeholders on board so that right policies are framed to save the lives of thousands of people. There is enough scope to learn from the experiences of the developed countries in this field.