734 deaths in 1,927 accidents in Nagpur, yet RTO gets mere Rs 2.05 lakh Road Safety Fund

NAGPUR: Though the district witnessed 734 fatalities in 1,927 road accidents in 2021 alone and over 60 black spots have been identified which need immediate corrective measures, the transport department comprising City, East and Rural RTOs has received a minuscule Rs2.05 lakh as Road Safety Fund (RSF).
The RTO revealed this information during a road safety audit meeting chaired by additional transport commissioner Jitendra Patil in Nagpur on Friday.
As per data, Nagpur rural recorded 969 accidents that claimed 466 lives, while city roads witnessed 268 deaths in 958 road accidents in 2021.
As per the RTO’s report, various agencies — NMC, NIT, state PWD, NHAI etc — that own the roads are working on road improvement on 66 black spots identified across the city and rural areas in 2020.
The road safety audit also revealed that of the 66 black spots, the highest number of accident-prone stretches (42) were in Nagpur rural. This was followed by 13 and 11 under the Nagpur East and Nagpur City RTO jurisdictions, respectively.
The report claimed corrective measures were taken at 48 spots. Now, the traffic police have submitted a fresh list of 52 black spots, including 10 accident-prone spots from the list of 66, which witness frequent road accidents.
The report also revealed that 60% road accidents were caused due to overspeeding, accounting for 63% fatalities. Over 41% two-wheeler riders died due to head injuries as they did not wear helmet, the report stated. Similarly, 13% four-wheeler drivers died due to non-usage of seatbelts, the report stated quoting the Supreme Court Road Safety Committee.
However, the transport commissioner’s office in Mumbai has sanctioned Rs80,000 (City), Rs45,000 (East) and Rs80,000 (Rural) as Road Safety Fund. Traffic experts slammed the paltry funds sanctioned for road safety programmes.
City and East offices had penalised 4,485 motorists for flouting various provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act such as driving without helmet, not using seatbelt, using mobile while driving and overloading of vehicles etc. Similarly, the RTO (Nagpur rural) flying squad had penalised 2,963 violators.
Besides these actions, the transport department had also suspended driving licences of 6,185 (City), 1,631 (East) and 1,132 (Rural) drivers, respectively, for reckless driving.