Regulatory lapses have driven up avoidable deaths in India

NEW DELHI: All accidents are avoidable, but the Amritsar tragedy would rank among the most avoidable ones. If only organisers of the event had appealed to the people to get off the railway tracks, instead of lauding them for being there. If only the train could have been stopped or slowed. If only the effigy was lit a few minutes later. Any of these could have saved 59 lives on Friday evening.Ironically the count of avoidable deaths—classified as unnatural accidents by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB)—is very high in India.Such accidents killed more than 39 lakh people between 2004 and 2015. Accidents at railway tracks and crossings alone caused over 26,000 deaths during the period, that’s six deaths a day.Among deaths caused by unnatural accidents, road mishaps are the largest killer, claiming about 15 lakh lives during the 12-year period. In 2015 — the latest year for which data is available — about 1.5 lakh people were killed in road accidents, a figure 64% higher than road accident fatalities in 2004.“Faulty traffic engineering and poor enforcement, awareness and regulation are to be blamed for many of these accidents”, said a senior IPS officer, who added that weather conditions and topography further contribute to making many spots accident prone.While road and rail accidents contribute the chunk of avoidable deaths, incidents involving explosions and house collapse, mostly as a result of regulatory lapses at factories and in construction, too, account for a sizeable number of such casualties. Further, National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB) data for 2004-2015 shows that falls and electrocution were big killers. each claiming over 1 lakh lives during the 12-year period.After roads, drowning is the second-largest killer, accounting for more than 3 lakh deaths between 2004-2015. While over 8,000 people were killed because their boat capsized, the remaining deaths were caused by people accidentally falling into water bodies. The data shows that like traffic accidents, cases of death by drowning also increased over the years.In 2004, drowning caused over 21,000 deaths with figure increasing to about 30,000 for 2015. “It has been noticed that there are certain spots where drowning incidents are common. But because of various administrative issues very little can be done about these spots. For instance, the Bawana canal in outer Delhi has steep walls on both sides at several spots; a person who accidently falls into the canal will have little chance of climbing back. Because of administrative issues, very little can be done to rectify that”, said a senior official.Railway tracks and crossings are deadly spots, too. Between 2004 and 2015, over 26,000 lives were lost in accidents at railway crossings alone. A senior IAS officer says that the removal of illegal structures that stand alongside railway tracks can significantly reduce the number of such deaths. However, these constructions prove difficult to remove because of political reasons. Other major causes of avoidable deaths are fire, falls and electrocution, each of which kills lakhs of people.“Since we are a developing country, our safety and threat perception is far lower than that of the advanced countries,” said a senior IAS officer. “In many cases, such deaths can be avoided by running awareness campaigns.”