Hyderabad: While the national average is 28 deaths in every 100 road accidents, it is 36 deaths for every 100 road accidents in Telangana. This is mainly because of the absence of emergency trauma care centres and ambulances on national and state highways.
There are no ambulances at the accident-prone stretches identified on highways.
The Telangana State Road Safety Authority has submitted proposals for setting up of traffic police stations attached with trauma care facilities including ambulance and cranes for every 50 km on highways, that stretch up to 2,500 km in Telangana, but the government is sitting on it.
The proposal to set up a traffic-cum-road safety department is also pending. Over 20,000 accidents occur and 7,000 people die every year in road accidents in TS. The situation is a little better in the city.
National highways, which comprise 10 per cent of the total road length in the state, account for 28 per cent of the total deaths due to road accidents.
The situation is not better on state highways too, which comprise 12 per cent of the total length of roads in the state. They account for 22 per cent of total deaths in road accidents.
When it comes to the city, the percentage of deaths is less than 5 per cent of the total deaths in road accidents in the state.
Hyderabad traffic police said due to traffic congestion, ambulances are not able to transport accident victims to hospitals within the city. This is the reason for the death rate being around 5 per cent in city.
“Awareness is growing among road users who are now giving way to ambulances,” said a traffic cop.
TS Road Safety Authority additional director general of police Krishna Prasad said road accidents were claiming more lives than deaths due to other crimes.
“If 1,000 people are murdered due to extremists, terrorists, land disputes, or for any other dispute in a year, the number is 7,000 in road accidents,” he said.
NHAI regional officer for TS J. Chandrasekhar Reddy said they have provided ambulances and cranes at toll plazas on national highways, which account for the highest number of deaths.
There are not enough emergency trauma care centres, he said. TS Roads and Buildings officials said the government would soon set up trauma care centres along with traffic police stations, patrolling vehicles, cranes and ambulances with oxygen and other facilities on highways.
A separate traffic-cum-road safety department will also be set up soon, an official said.
