THIS is unacceptable that the authorities have failed to stop goods vehicles from carrying passengers, which adds to increased fatalities in road accidents. Although the Road Transport Act 2018 has banned goods vehicles from carrying passengers and made it a punishable offence, the provision is rarely enforced. In May, a large number of accidents involved trucks, and covered and pickup vans. Out of the total vehicles involved in road accidents, the highest of 29.2 per cent were trucks, covered and pickup vans and other goods vehicles, and 36 people inside the vehicles died in accidents, as a Road Safety Foundation report says. In 2022, out of the total vehicles involved in road accidents, 25.4 per cent were trucks, covered and pickup vans, and other goods vehicles and 453 people inside the vehicles died, as the organisation said. On June 11, four, including three students, died and 15 were injured when a pickup van carrying them collided with a covered van at Sadar Dakshin in Cumilla on the Dhaka–Chattogram Highway. Two other recent fatal accidents involving passengers carrying goods vehicles on June 7 and May 27 in Sylhet and Habiganj killed at least 18 people.

Carrying passengers in goods vehicles is dangerous as the degree of exposure to fatalities during accidents is high because the vehicles are not designed to carry people. In some cases, owners of goods vehicles illegally modify the structures to carry passengers. Road safety activists say that drivers of goods vehicles, after carrying goods to Dhaka or other major cities, take passengers illegally and bribe the law enforcers to get away. The incidence increases during festivals. Besides passenger riding on goods vehicles, other forms of traffic law violation are rampant in the absence of effective implementation of the road laws. Reports identify overloading, an increase in the number of three-wheelers, lack of lights, absence of road markings or signs on highways, faulty road engineering, violations of traffic rules, unskilled drivers, the movement of unfit vehicles as causes of the accidents. On an average, 25 people die daily in road accidents. At least, 468 people died in 496 road accidents only in May while at least 9,000 died in road accidents in 2022, as the Passenger Welfare Association says. All this suggests that the government has failed to enforce the Road Transport Act 2018 that it enacted after countrywide road safety protests by students.

The government must, therefore, enforce the Road Transport Act and adequately address issues such as passenger riding on goods vehicles, unskilled drivers, reckless driving, unfit vehicles, road construction defects and others. The authorities must enforce the road transport law stringently and all agencies concerned must work with dedication and accountability for the sustainable development of the road sector.