Road Safety Foundation, an NGO working on making the country’s roads safer, at a press conference on Saturday said that at least 1,128 children were killed in road accidents across the country last year.
While addressing the press conference in the capital Dhaka, Professor Dr A I Mahbub uddin Ahmed,Chairman of the Road Safety Foundation said, more than 17% of the total casualties were children.
The Road Safety Foundation in their data claimed that last year, the number of accidents in the country increased compared to that in the previous year. However, the number of deaths in road accidents decreased.
The number of child deaths due to accidents also decreased slightly compared to that in the previous year. Of the total deceased, 974 were women which is around 15% of the total casualties.
Besides, some 2,487 were killed in 2,532 motorcycle-related accidents in 2023.
38.12% were motor bikers and passengers of the total casualties.
Some 229 were killed in private car, ambulance and jeep related accidents while 193 were killed in bicycle, rickshaw and pedal van related accidents. According to the Road Safety Foundation, 36 police personnel were killed in 2023. Among them, 23 police personnel were killed in bike accidents while 6 police members were killed on duty as pedestrians.
7 police personnel were killed as passengers of various other vehicles.
72 ready-made garments workers were killed in 56 road accidents in different parts of the country.
61 RMG workers were also injured last year. Among the victims of the road crash, 59%64 were male while 40.35% were female RMG workers.
The charity organization also claimed that at least 6,524 people were killed and 11,407 injured in 6,911 road accidents in 2023.
Talking to Bangladesh Post, Saidur Rahman, Executive Director of the Road Safety Foundation said, they had collected the information from different sources including from national newspapers.
Responding to another question, he said that they also have their own channel of collecting data of the road accidents from different parts of the country.
The Road Safety Foundation also gave a set of recommendations to minimize the road accidents in the country.
Their recommendations include making skilled drivers, specifying salary and working hours of the drivers, enhancing capabilities of the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority, ensuring the implementation of the traffic rules, constructing service lanes in highway and road dividers.
They also urged initiatives to stop the extortions in the public transport sector.