SC mulls pan-India guidelines to prevent road accidents on expressways, NHs

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday mulled formulating pan-India guidelines to prevent road accidents, such as a recent one in Rajasthan's Phalodi that claimed 15 lives, on expressways and national highways. A bench of Justices J K Maheswari and Vijay Bishnoi flagged the construction of illegal "dhabas" on both sides of national highways and expressways as a possible cause of road accidents and asked Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who appeared in the matter for the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), to submit the statutory rules and regulations for initiating action against these eateries. The court also sought to know about the action taken so far, which authority is responsible for initiating it and which bodies are not implementing the provisions. "After discussion between amicus and solicitor general, issues resolved by them, which may be helpful for issuance of the guidelines, also to be produced. In the meantime, parties are at liberty to exchange Google images, which may be helpful in resolving the real problem," the court ordered.

Mehta submitted, "We have the power to remove the illegal dhabas and eateries, but there has been a general delegation to the local district magistrate. The local police and other authorities are under his command and control, which the NHAI does not have. So we have to find out a solution." Terming the issue non-adversarial, he said normally, there is a service road after certain kilometres on every expressway and national highway, where the vehicles that suffer a breakdown are put. Justice Bishnoi acknowledged that there are service roads but pointed out that it is not the case for every expressway and national highway, and that illegal dhabas and small eateries come up in between, where most of the accidents take place. The bench said the NHAI's report seeks to blame local contractors or the administration for the encroachments on the highways but the court wants to know which authority under the law is required to oversee that these eateries do not come up. Justice Maheshwari said the court wants to formulate guidelines to fill up the existing gaps in the provisions and ensure their implementation to prevent a repetition of Phalodi-type accidents.

Appearing in the court on behalf of an intervenor, advocate Pranav Sachdeva said the top court has already dealt with these issues and given certain directions that were not implemented. He pointed out that in Goa, there are highways that go through a medical college or a village, leading to road accidents. "I have filed the recent Supreme Court judgment directing the NHAI to develop an SOP (standard operating procedure) to remove encroachments," Sachdeva said. Justice Maheshwari said the issue is not of one state alone but of the entire country and the court is looking at the wider picture for formulating the guidelines. Senior advocate A N S Nadkarni, who has been appointed as an amicus curiae (friend of the court) in the matter, said he has filed Google images to show widespread encroachments on the highways. On November 10, the court had sought responses from the NHAI and the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways in a suo-motu case in connection with the Phalodi accident. It had also asked the NHAI and the ministry to get a survey of the area conducted and file a report on the number of dhabas on the highway passing through Phalodi. It had also sought a specific report on the condition of the highway and the norms followed by the contractor for road maintenance. The apex court took suo-motu (on its own) cognisance of the November 2 incident in Phalodi, in which 10 women and four children were among the 15 people killed when a tempo traveller rammed into a stationary trailer truck. The accident took place near Matoda village on the Bharat Mala highway when the tempo traveller was headed to Jodhpur from Bikaner's Kolayat temple.