Positively unsafe

Entry-level cars need tighter safety regulations

Two more entry-level passenger cars, the Maruti Suzuki Swift and the Nissan Datsun GO, have failed crash tests carried out by the Global New Car Assessment Programme (GNCAP). The organisation has called on Nissan to withdraw its car. This comes after similar tests conducted on a range of entry-level passenger cars - the Maruti Suzuki Alto, the Tata Nano, the Hyundai i10, the Ford Figo and the Volkswagen Polo (the model without airbags has since been withdrawn) - earlier pronounced them substandard, with zero rating on a scale of five. This is a major concern. Car manufacturers and their lobby, the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (Siam), should immediately end their current state of denial and inform the public about their road map for meeting globally accepted car safety standards. It is most unfortunate that both the manufacturers and Siam have sought to defend themselves by claiming that they meet all Indian regulations, when these are clearly inadequate and way behind global best practices.

The GNCAP is not a newly arrived non-governmental organisation (NGO). It is a network of consumer watchdogs that work with various national car safety regulatory organisations to evolve safety ratings. It aims to achieve the United Nations' Decade of Action for Road Safety (2011-20) target of reducing road accidents by 50 per cent. The first NCAP was initiated in 1979 by the United States National Highway Safety Administration. This has been followed by similar NGO watchdog organisations in the European Union, Australia, New Zealand, Latin America, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and China. India itself has started overhauling its road safety architecture by announcing the Bharat New Vehicle Safety Assessment Programme that is supposed to, in a couple of years' time, put in place a safety-regime benchmark for Indian cars, akin to what the recent GNCAP crash tests have been trying to achieve. Siam is itself cooperating with the government and helping evolve the parameters of the Bharat programme.

The fact, however, is that India has one of the worst road safety records in the world and one of the ways in which to change this is to manufacture safer cars. It is inexcusable that airbags are not mandatory. If an entry-level car costs around Rs 30,000 more to have safety devices that are now globally considered the minimum, then that is a price which has to be paid. An issue is being made of the GNCAP tests crashing cars at 64 kilometres per hour (kmph) instead of the United Nations-mandated 56 kmph. The GNCAP says this is to replicate usual driving practices - and typically new cars on Indian highways often do well above 70 kmph, never mind the rules. The government should get tough on the safety of new cars because India harbours dreams of becoming a major car exporter. But can it, if the cars it makes do not meet minimal United Nations safety standards?