PANAJI
Tourist taxis brought tourism to a screeching halt for three consecutive days earlier this month. At the root of this strike was the central government notification making speed governors compulsory for commercial passenger vehicles.
Transport Department of Goa has argued that tourist taxi drivers drive in a rash manner across the highways and other roads in Goa causing road accidents and that fitment of speed governors would be beneficial in arresting this trend.
However, contrary to this claim, the latest report on road accidents compiled by the Transport Research Wing of the Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways shows that taxis caused a mere 0.5 per cent of the total road accidents and 0.2 per cent of road accident fatalities in Goa.
The MoRTH report titled “Road Accidents in India-2016” has mapped the steady rise in the number of road accidents in Goa from 4,294 in 2013 to 4,304 accidents in 2016. The number of fatal accidents has also increased from 249 in 2013 to 316 in 2016.
In the year 2016, 316 fatal accidents resulted in 336 deaths. As per the report, the severity of road accidents in Goa, which refers to the number of persons killed per 100 road accidents, stood at 7.8 in 2016, one for the highest among small states of the country. The report also includes a comprehensive classification of road accidents according to the type of vehicle which caused the accident. Interestingly, among the ten odd-types of vehicle categories listed by MoRTH, taxis are the least dangerous four-wheeler vehicles on Goan roads. The figures provided in the report show that taxis caused 25 road accidents in Goa in 2016, a mere 0.5 per cent of the total 4,304 accidents and resulted in the death of one person, 0.2 per cent of total road accident fatalities recorded in the same year. As against this, scooters and motorcycles caused the highest number of accidents and fatalities followed closely by cars, buses and trucks.
