CBSE To Add "ROAD SAFETY" In School Curriculum

India has been maintaining the unreliable distinction of having one of the worst road safety records compared to the whole world, reflecting the lack of a culture in "Road use behavior". Hence "Road Safety" is added as a part of syllabus on overdue.

According to the Joint secretary, ministry of road transport and highways Nitin R Gokarn, road safety is being related to all the subjects for classes 8 to 12 as a part of CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) syllabus. This may not be a Boring subject for students, in-fact related with science, civics and history. It will be incorporated as interesting snippets so that students keep it in their mind", he said.

Adding that the core committee on the syllabus of the human resources ministry would take a final call. He also said that the NCERT syllabus is fixing up the text. It will be very practical. Giving an instance, he said students would be asked to ponder over what the impact would be if a motorbike driven at speed of 80 kilometers per hour swerves off the road during a turn, related to physics.

Earlier, speaking at the event, he pointed out that there was a fatality every nine minutes due to road accidents in the country. Gokarn said "There are 5 lakh accidents reported in the country every year and 1.4 lakh deaths due to accidents. This works out to an accident every four minutes and a fatality every nine minutes". On stating that people tend to flout road rules with impunity, one main reason was "Lack of Enforcement".

He further added that, the major proportion of accidents was from Tier-II cities, where people tend to break traffic rules more."The fatalities are much more in Tier-II cities". Well, people in the country don't have the culture of "Road user behavior" and tend to ignore the rules relating to Right of way, and use of service roads among other things.

He also explains on how a speed could turn fatal, he said for a motor cycle being driven at beyond 20 kmph the chance of an accident is very high. "In case of a bike being driven beyond 40 kmph, the risk of accident is exponential and beyond 80 kmph, fatality is certain". There were no scientific studies on Road Safety."

What do you think? Will the study on "ROAD SAFETY" bring up good results. Is it only public who is responsible for damages of Roads. Or just a start to educate people on how to follow road rules and safety.