Nepal’s roads and highways are no paragons of safety. Already precarious roads that snake along hills and ridges are made even more dangerous by the reckless habits of long-haul drivers and inclement weather, especially during the monsoon. Every year, hundreds perish in road accidents. In the year 2012-13, there were 13,582 road accidents, and 1,816 fatalities across the country, according to the Department of Roads (DoR). Since 2007, most of these accidents—an average of 43.7 percent—have been attributed to the negligence of drivers. Besides speeding, the lack of speed limits on highways, reckless overtaking on blind turns, overloaded buses and trucks and the poor condition of vehicles are major reasons for accidents.
This year, the monsoon—the season of death on Nepal’s roads—has yet to begin and already, a major accident has claimed 18 lives. On Wednesday, a passenger bus was rammed by a truck at Narpani in Arghakhanchi district. The bus swerved and fell 200 metres, killing eight on the spot and 10 others en route to a hospital 13 kilometres away. Thirty-one passengers have been seriously injured. Similarly, at the turn of the New Year on January 1, there were 23 fatalities in three separate accidents in a span of less than 24 hours. If other sporadic incidents are to be included, the death count for this year is already nearing a hundred.
This is a horrific state of affairs that cannot be allowed to continue unabated. Many see roads, no matter how poorly made, as a sign of development. But too often, dangerous roads end up doing more harm than good. The DoR estimates that road accidents disproportionately affect males between the ages of 15-40, the nation’s most economically valuable age-group.
Their deaths can leave families destitute and cost the nation millions in treatment and healthcare. The solution, however, is not to stop building roads but to make them safer.
Since most accidents are due to negligence, it would be wise for the government to invest in training and awareness programmes for long-haul drivers and then on oversight. Traffic police must be deployed along highways to monitor speeding and reckless driving with the same zeal and frequency that they are in the Kathmandu Valley. Drunk driving, especially when it comes to passenger buses, big and small, must be treated with zero tolerance. Another related problem concerns drivers who work long hours, often to the point of exhaustion. Buses operating on long-haul routes must be made to hire at least two drivers who can take turns and something similar could be considered for the truck drivers. Furthermore, easy interventions can be made to cut road accidents dramatically. Pedestrian roads need pavements and crosswalks while highways need clearly marked junctions and central barriers to prevent head-on collisions. Nepal’s hill roads would also benefit from cliff-side barriers. Those living alongside highways must also be made aware of the dangers, both to themselves and vehicles, of jaywalking.
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