- Saturday, April 20, 2024
By: Shubham Ghosh
INDIAN road transport minister Nitin Gadkari, who is known for his innovative approach to work, has lashed out at select automakers accusing them of compromising on safety standards in India when compared to the same offering in other markets in the world.
He expressed his disappointment after his ministry issued a draft to implement six airbags as standard across all car models that can carry up to eight passengers, from October this year. It has also approved a draft to introduce India’s own crash-test agency – Bharat NCAP (New Car Assessment Programme), in April next year.
“We have taken a decision for mandatory provision of six airbags in cars, even in the economic models. Now some of the companies are making cars in India which are not up to international standards. But they are making cars of the same model, which comply with the international standard, for the foreign market. I can never understand this. We need to understand the importance of such decisions. When India reports maximum road crashes and deaths, why are they not taking it seriously?” Gadkari asked.
Automotive and motorcycling website ZigWheels.com cited the case of Seltos, a popular model from South Korea’s Kia which could manage only three stars in the Global NCAP crash test. But the same car, manufactured outside India, did better in a more stringent Australian NCAP crash test where it got full five stars.
The website said while safety features will vary from market to market, the India-spec model’s structure was unstable while that of the international model was more stable.
Despite the Indian transport ministry issuing a draft to make six airbags standard for all car models, Carens, a new model introduced by Kia which gets a long standard safety feature list including six airbags, could get an average of three stars because of an unstable body, ZigWheels reported.
Gadkari has expressed concern over India’s high rate of road accident deaths and said that efforts would be made to reduce accidents on roads by 50 per cent before the end of 2024. He also stressed on bringing down the cost of road construction by 50 per cent without making any compromise on quality.
