Road accidents.

A road traffic/accident is any accident involving at least one road vehicle in motion on a public road or private road to which the public has right of access, resulting in at least one injured or killed person.

In Nepal’s case, the causes of accidents are obvious enough. Road transport safety basically involves three things: road, vehicle and driver. There are lapses on all three fronts. Tracks are being opened haphazardly across the country without adhering to even basic engineering. The narrow roads are built with hairpin turns in difficult terrains. To add to the danger, old and dilapidated vehicles ply such perilous roads. Likewise, reckless driving along the dirt roads has been a serious problem for years.

Road accidents this past weekend claimed the lives of 20 people across the country. At least 12 people died in a bus accident on Friday night in Dang, while on Saturday five perished in a car crash at Chandragiri and two were killed in another road accident in Baglung. Separately, a pedestrian was killed in a hit-and-run in Syangja on Monday. Road transport, it appears, is getting riskier day by day in Nepal. But there have been few if any effective initiatives to cut down on the number of fatal incidents on our roads.

Road transport safety has not gotten the urgency it deserves. Following accidents, official initiatives are often limited to expressing condolence for the bereaved families, discussing the tragic incidents for a few days and at the most forming a probe panel in the case of comparably bigger accidents. On Sunday as well, the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport formed a five-member panel to find the root causes of fatal road incidents. If only the recommendations of such panels would be implemented!

Reckless driving, poor engineering, and a lack of emergency response make Nepal’s highways deathtraps.

Nepal’s topography and weather make it difficult to build and maintain roads. Highways and rural roads wrap around mountains, traverse cliffs, follow narrow river gorges. Entire sections of Nepal’s arterial highways are in a permanent state of disrepair during the monsoon, like the landslide-prone Mugling-Narayanghat Highway. 

“Most accidents happen when the curves on the road and the speed of vehicles do not match,” adds Shrestha. “We also have a lot of blind spots along our highways which makes driving difficult.”  

Poor highway engineering is a major factor in deadly accidents, says transport expert Chandra B Shrestha, now a consultant with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. The rockslide in Palpa, he notes, was caused by an inability to properly stabilise the slope.

Nepal’s motorable roads are classified into Strategic Road Networks, which include major highways under the purview of the Department of Roads, and Local Road Networks which are built and maintained by local governments. 

While the main highways have to follow engineering parameters to be approved for construction, local roads are built without adequate engineering, making them more dangerous. 

“Local governments have taken charge of the construction of rural roads without fulfilling any of the required technical criteria,” says transport expert Madhu Sudan Acharya, adding that they are built without an understanding of road geometry or slope geology. 

In a recent example in Kathmandu, two people died and several were injured when a speeding bus collided with a Bolero as it swerved to avoid a motorbike coming from the opposite direction. .“Nepal’s existing road safety practices and protocols make it pretty clear that transport management authority is unable to govern properly, and needs massive overhaul.

A 2023 study by the Emergency Department of the College of Medical Sciences and Teaching Hospital over a six-month period from January to June 2022 revealed that 9.58% of the 7,654 patients had been admitted to the emergency unit for Road Traffic Accidents, and 65% of the cases had occurred along highways.