Gujarats road safety gap widens with nearly 36K fatalities in five years despite rise in e-challans
AHMEDABAD: Fresh Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha data on Thursday have highlighted gaps in Gujarats road management architecture, where road accidents and fatalities continue to rise despite an increase in e-challans and fines. The data showed an explosive rise in e-challans -- Gujarat issued 2.84 lakh challans in 2022, a number that shot up nearly six times to 16.04 lakh in 2023, and then spiralled to an astonishing 43.24 lakh in 2024. But the enforcement surge comes with a troubling twist: unpaid challans are rising faster than recoveries. While fines recovered in 2022 stood at Rs 103.35 crore, they grew to Rs 150.18 crore in 2023 and Rs 188.61 crore in 2024. Yet unpaid dues jumped even faster from Rs 43.88 crore in 2022 to Rs 135.62 crore in 2023, before tripling to Rs 302.10 crore in 2024. Rule 167 of the CMVR mandates that challans be disposed of within 90 days, and delinquency should block licence or registration-related processes. But Gujarats unpaid docket suggests that the rulebook is either under-enforced or routinely bypassed. The fallout is visible on the roads. Gujarats road accident data from 2020 to 2024 shows a persistently high and uneven pattern. The state registered 13,398 accidents in 2020, rising to 15,186 in 2021, 15,751 in 2022, and peaking at 16,349 in 2023, before dipping slightly to 15,588 in 2024. Fatalities show the same trajectory, increasing from 6,170 deaths in 2020 to 7,452 in 2021, 7,618 in 2022, and 7,854 in 2023, with a marginal drop to 7,717 in 2024. Total for five years: 76,272 accidents and 36,811 deaths. Over-speeding remains Gujarats major cause of accidents. Accidents due to speeding jumped from 12,449 (2020) to 14,718 (2023), while fatalities stubbornly remained above 7,000 every year, touching 7,278 in 2023 and 7,193 in 2024. The numbers show that despite soaring challans, the behaviour most frequently penalised remains the one most frequently ignored. Overloading offences show a quieter but persistent rise, with accidents increasing from 671 in 2020 to 754 in 2024, and fatalities rising from 358 to 384 in the same period. Fatalities due to non-wearing of helmets climbed sharply from 2,106 in 2020 to 3,021 in 2024, a nearly 44% jump. Seatbelt-related deaths rose from 798 in 2020 to 963 in 2024, signalling that the most basic safety habits remain deeply ignored even as e-challans proliferate. Adding to the chaos is the rise in accidents involving drivers without licences, which surged from 791 in 2020 to 1,251 in 2023. Taken together, the data unmasks Gujarats paradox: a state issuing record e-challans but still failing to curb the behaviours that kill the most.
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