Safety in Construction, Operations and Maintenance of Highways – Basic Elements of Safety Audit
R K Poddar, HSE Management Consultant, Auditor and Trainer
Premise
On-road safety in India is amongst the poorest in the world. As per some rough estimate conducted few years back, more than 90,000 lives are lost on Indian roads every year. Rough assessment suggests that road accidents cause financial loss to the country to an extent of 2% to 3% of GDP, besides causing loss to the victims, their families and leaving behind a lingering agony to the society at large. The earlier thinking that human factor is a major, perhaps the only factor, that cause accidents on roads. This thinking is fast changing. It is being now recognized world over that the road system contributes significantly besides human errors and negligence. The road system, therefore, should be so designed and executed in such a manner that it takes into account the human failings. This realization has helped the developed countries to bring about considerable improvement in the safety on their road and they are able to build this aspect into constructing their road system as 'forgiving' as possible.This is a premium article available exclusively for our subscribers.
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NBM&CW September 2010
