According to Dr. Amir Shaikh, DIG Karachi Traffic Police, five fatal accidents occur every two days on roads in the city. Statistics for the first four months of 2016 were shared with the media. Talking about the total number of accidents in last three year, the DIG was quoted saying,
“Very little improvement has occurred so far as 30,000 accidents were reported every year. This year, so far, has not proved to be much different.”
He further remarked that in almost 90% of cases, parties involved in the accidents often come up to some sort of agreement with each other. 40% of patients brought to Emergency at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre are involved in some kind of traffic accident.
Also Read: Traffic Violation Evidence System (TVES) By Karachi Traffic Police Is Gaining Momentum
He also told the press that over speeding is clearly the reason for most of the accidents, especially on Superhighway. Despite several warnings, the drivers do no pay much attention.
Other than over speeding, DIG Dr. Amir Shaikh said that factors like unnecessary and dangerous overtaking, and underage or unskilled drivers cause the majority of accidents. The DIG further said that many of those untrained drivers do not have any sort of driving permit.
The data has revealed that 60% of drivers do not possess a valid driving license. Karachi City Traffic Police deploys around 3,200 personnel to modulate around 3.79 million vehicles across the city through various junctions and intersections. Cars make a bit more than 32% of that traffic whereas motorcycles and rickshaws make around 55% and 5.5% of total traffic respectively.
More than 900 vehicles keep on adding to the bulk every day. A safe estimation suggests that each traffic police officer has to manage 1031 vehicles each day in Karachi.
Dr. Shaikh mentioned the Superhighway, the National Highway, Korangi Industrial Area, Main Korangi Road, Sharea Faisal and Mauripur Road as the accident hotspots.
“over speeding is clearly the reason for most of the accidents”
We as a nation are obsessed with easy targets. Every time we read about traffic accident in the newspaper, it is always:
حادثہ تیزرفتاری کے باعث پیش آیا۔
It is very easy to torture the drivers by meting out street justice. However, it is very difficult to solve the real problems which cause accidents such as:
poor infrastructure,
potholes,
absence of street lights,
absence of traffic signs,
absence of lane markings,
improper fitness of vehicle (which is not the responsibility of driver, but the responsibility of owner and traffic police),
overloading (not the responsibility of driver, but the responsibility of owner),
slippery surface of road under use even after it should have been resurfaced a long time ago (the measure of slipperiness of surface is the British Pendulum Number),
rutting,
wrong-way driving by motorcyclists,
absence of safety features such as ABS, seat belt, helmet (only the vehicle manufacturers and government can do something about it, not the driver’s fault),
improper/non-working lights on vehicles (brake light, reverse light etc., too bright HIDs etc.),
fog,
substandard spare parts & unavailability of high quality spare parts (if you remember UAE declared selling of counterfeit spare parts as “attempt to murder” as part of their Vision 2020 road safety program),
unsafe highways (people run like mad for their life on the highways).
But it is very easy to blame “high speed” because the driver is himself/herself a victim of the cruel system which prefers torture as the method of taking blood rather than promoting effective methods to achieve fruitful goals.
In German autobahn people continuously drive on 260 kph, if speed killed, why won’t so many accidents and deaths occur there?
On Emirates road, there is continuous flow at 139 kph, why don’t so many people die there?
In Pakistan on motorway also, so many people drive way above the speed limit, yet very few deaths happen. Why?
You nailed it mate!