Road accidents caused nearly a death an hour last year, according to a study.
In the study released at a press conference in the capital yesterday, Bangladesh Jatri Kalyan Samity, a commuters’ association, found that 8,589 people had died in road accidents across the country in 2014. The study is based on data collated from 10 national and five newspapers.
The association’s Secretary General Mozammel Haque Chawdhury said: “This is first time we have published a complete report on the road accident situation in Bangladesh.”
The report’s findings show that 17,523 were hurt in road accidents – with 1,623 suffering life-long injuries – and 8,589 were killed in 5,928 road accidents between January and December 2014.
“This is an enormous death toll, yet the government has not taken steps to reduce road accidents,” Mozammel said.
“There is no verifiable databank on the number of accidents in the country. That is why we tried to tally the number of accidents and casualties using published newspaper reports. We believe the death toll and number of accidents is actually higher than this,” he said.
The number of deaths caused by accidents on the roads and highways in Bangladesh is a matter of dispute.
The National Road Safety Council (NRSC) claimed in its annual report published in January that over the last five years, road accidents claimed 2,529 lives on average every year, while last year’s death toll was below 2,000.
The NRSC report is based on data collected from police headquarters.
