Saturday 21st June, 2025
The Department of Motor Traffic (DMT) has taken about 44 vehicles including 15 SLTB and private buses off the road, following a random vehicle inspection on the Hatton-Kandy road on 19 June. About 115 vehicles underwent roadside checks, we are told. In other words, about 38% of vehicles inspected by the DMT randomly in one location in the central hills were found to be unroadworthy. This can be considered a microcosm of the overall situation in the country.
Action taken by the DMT to identify unroadworthy vehicles as part of ongoing efforts to make roads safe is commendable, albeit belated. Last month’s tragedy where an SLTB bus carrying 75 passengers went down a precipice, killing 21 of them, near Ramboda, may have jolted the DMT and the police into action. The vehicle inspection programme should be expanded to cover the entire country. If it is not feasible to do so due to resource constraints, etc., it should be conducted in at least in the areas where road accidents are frequent. The police have identified quite a few blackspots across the country.
Meanwhile, the DIG in charge of Traffic Control and Road Safety Indika Hapugoda has revealed that 1,133 fatal road accidents have claimed about 2,000 lives so far this year, according to media reports. This must have sent a chill down everyone’s spine. Assuming that the media reports quoting DIG Hapugoda are accurate, the number of lives lost in road accidents during the first six months of the current year is only slightly lower than that in the whole of last year. It has been reported that about 2,141 road accidents left about 2,243 individuals dead in 2024. The number of road fatalities average seven a day, and it is likely to be much higher this year.
Director of the Colombo National Hospital Orthopedic Services Department, Dr. Indika Jagoda, has rightly called road accident fatalities a ‘silent epidemic’, which has not received the same public attention as dengue and other such diseases. Road accidents exert a severe strain on the state-run hospitals, and their economic and social costs are enormous. As we pointed out in a previous editorial comment, a comprehensive World Bank report, Delivering Road Safety in Sri Lanka; Leadership Priorities and Initiatives to 2030, reveals that ‘the high road crash fatality and injury rates on Sri Lanka’s roads undermine the economic growth and progress made over the past decade on reducing poverty and boosting prosperity’. The report says the annual crash deaths per capita in Sri Lanka are twice the average rate in high-income countries and five times that of the best performing countries in the world! Sri Lanka reportedly has the worst road fatality rate among its immediate neighbours in the South Asia region.
Unroadworthy vehicles must be identified and taken off roads, and punitive action taken against their owners for endangering the lives of all road users. However, they are only one of the causative factors. Road safety experts have identified as the common causes of crashes on expressways and other roads in Sri Lanka the following, among others: speeding, distractions, recklessness, fatigue, driving under the influence of alcohol or narcotics, inclement weather conditions, inadequate road conditions, tailgating, improper lane changes, inexperience of drivers, overtaking dangerously, poor visibility, poor signage or lack of road markings and impatience or time pressure. One of the aforesaid factors or a combination of two or more of them could lead to fatal accidents on any road. So, the success of any strategy to prevent road mishaps hinges on addressing these causative factors as well.
