Old Mumbai-Pune Highway fatalities down by 54%, says study

The data was released by Old Mumbai-Pune Highway Vision Zero project, a joint initiative of Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC), Maharashtra Highway Police, Skoda Auto Volkswagen India and SaveLIFE Foundation.

In 2018, when the project was initiated, the Mumbai-Pune section of NH-48 had 268 fatalities.

“As a result of interventions carried out under this project, the number of fatalities reduced to 206 in 2019. Though in 2020, the actual number of fatalities stand at 79 as per police records, in order to report the impact of the project, a conservative figure of 123 has been considered on the basis of fatalities in Q1 and Q4 of the year, when Covid-19 related challenges and restrictions were negligible. The extrapolation to 123 fatalities also took into account past available trends from Qs 2 and 3 of other years,” said a press statement from the SaveLIFE Foundation.

The stretch of the National Highway 48 between Pune and Mumbai is referred to as the Old Mumbai Pune Highway. Before the six-lane Expressway became operational in early 2000s, the Old Highway was the only direct road link between two metros.

Commenting on the work done by MSRDC, Dr Chandrakant Pulkundwar, Joint Managing Director, MSRDC said, “Last year, we spearheaded certain key initiatives on NH-48 which have helped us improve road safety including eradication of the black spot on the stretch of road referred to as the Anda Point. We now have dedicated patrol vehicles to also ensure strong enforcement to remove illegally parked vehicles.”

Bhushan Kumar Upadhyay, Additional Director General of Police, Traffic said, “Old Mumbai-Pune Highway sees more diverse traffic with a lot of vulnerable road users plying on it. We have therefore allocated additional personnel to strengthen the enforcement.”

Gurpratap Boparai, MD, Skoda Auto Volkswagen Group in India, said, “Skoda Volkswagen has a long-standing reputation for building vehicles that are reliable, trustworthy and safe. In an effort to further the cause of road safety, we have partnered with the SaveLIFE Foundation on the ‘Vision Zero’ project on the Old Mumbai-Pune Highway. We believe this model can work as a template for future road safety programmes across the country.”

Piyush Tewari, Founder and CEO of SaveLIFE Foundation said, “The success of this project is a testament of our partnership with Skoda Volkswagen Auto India, MSRDC and Maharashtra Police. Through this partnership we have been able to successfully showcase the success of the model on National Highways.”