No more booze outlets on National Highways?

To make national highways safer, the Ministry of Road, Transport and Highways plans to shutdown roadside liquor vends. With the “Don’t drink and drive” signs having little effect on drunken driving, the Centre has asked states to remove liquor shops located on national highways in an attempt to bring down road casualties. India witnesses about 5 lakh road accidents annually with 1.5 lakh fatalities, which is the highest in the world.

Madhya Pradesh and Bihar account for almost a quarter of all deaths due to drunk-driving. Among smaller states, Haryana and Uttarakhand have higher fatalities than even larger states.  The figures are expected to dip in Bihar after the recent introduction of total prohibition in the state.  

 The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has sent out an alert to state governments that they should refuse permission to liquor shops that are located or wish to be located on NHs and ban all liquor shops located on NHs. The Centre has taken a leaf out of Gujarat’s success story. Gujarat was the first state to ban liquor shops on highways, which brought down deaths on roads.

According to figures made available by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH), Gujarat recorded 1,339 accidents in 2009 due to drunk driving on NHs, but a concerted effort by the state administration by banning liquor sale on NHs across the state resulted in sharp decline in the number of accidents. In 2010, only 234 accidents due to drunk driving on NHs were reported, while the figure further came down to 212 in 2011. 

The countrywide figures for road accidents due to drunk driving stood at 27,152 in 2009, but in 2010 the figure went up to 31,000. The Centre claims that due to continuous mass awareness, the accident cases came down to 24,655 in 2011, that include 10,553 fatalities. 

According to the latest road accident report of the road transport ministry, the number of accidents caused due to driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs decreased to 20,290 in 2012 from 23,979 the previous year. Total death toll decreased significantly to 6,463 last year from 7,835 

in 2012. 

However, experts point out that the states to need to come on board for this to succeed. Given that most of accidents take place in states like Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, etc, where sale of liquor is not banned, banning on sale of booze on highways wouldn’t make it a hit. 

“If the Centre is really worried about bringing down death toll due to road accidents, it should work in direction of banning the production of liquor for indigenous consumption,” an official of road union said.