Risk and Road Traffic Accidents in Uttarakhand– Present Scenario, Analysis, Interpretation and Preventions.

Abstract

India being the developing and the second largest populated country with one of the fastest growing economy in the world. It paved the way to very fast urbanization in the country. The country faces many problems including transportation and road safety. The road patterns in Indian cities are very different as compared to western world.During the period 1970–2009, the nation's road length increased at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 3.2%, whereas the number of registered vehicles, RTCs, and fatalities grew at 12%, 3.8%, and 5.7% CAGR respectively. Exposure risk dropped from 103 to 11 fatalities per 10 000 vehicles but increased from 2.7 to 10.8 fatalities per 100000 people. In 2001, Andhra Pradesh had 7.5% of the nation's population but 10.4% fatalities. There is an alarming increase in road accidents in the country, which takes away more than 90,000 lives every year.Four major districts of Uttarakhand, namely, Dehradun (213), Haridwar (233), Nanital (134) and Udham singh nagar (223) - accounted for about 82% of total road accidents in Uttarakhand in 2018.In this research work, we tried to study the present road traffic crashes in the hilly state of India – Uttarakhand. We have also tried to identify and analyze the different types of risks involved in road traffic crashes and tried to analyze and interpret the ongoing and the latest trends in road traffic crashes in Uttarakhand (RTC). We also tried to suggest the preventive measures to be taken in Uttarakhand, regarding RTC. Analysis is done with the help of primary and secondary data using appropriate statistical tools.It is evident from the study that road accidents in Uttarakhand have decreased by 7% but fatalities rose by 8.2% as per 2017-18. From the combined analysis of the three variables, namely road conditions, individual factors and poor vehicle maintenance, all three factors have their own impact on the RTC.