At a time when Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) are becoming common among carmakers to make premium vehicles more appealing to customers, it seems like the Indian government is now looking forward to making ADAS mandatory.
In order to enhance road safety among people and to reduce road accidents in the country, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has proposed the installation of a ‘Moving Off Information System’ (MOIS) in a specific category of vehicles. As a part of the fresh draft, the Ministry could make ADAS-safety functions like ‘blind spot monitoring’ a standard feature across passenger and commercial vehicles.
Apart from that, it has also proposed collision warning systems to be specified under the automotive industry standard. Notably, the primary objective of the proposal is to mitigate the risk of collisions between vehicles and vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists particularly during low-speed moving-off maneuvers.
Road Ministry’s Draft Proposal for Mandating ADAS
Speaking about the draft proposal titled ‘Approval of Motor Vehicles with Regard to the Moving Off Information System for the Detection of Pedestrians and Cyclists,’ MOIS has been defined as a system designed to detect and inform the driver about the presence of pedestrians in close proximity. If necessary, it will also issue a warning to the driver about any potential collision, thus avoiding accidents. Notably, if implemented across all segments of passenger cars, it could potentially bring down the margin of road accidents in India.
In the present time, ADAS has been gaining a lot of popularity in India. A lot of carmakers in India have started offering this feature in the range topping models of new cars. While the new proposal might make Level 1 ADAS a standard feature in all the cars in India, it could also lead to an increase in car prices. In view of the proposed draft, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari has set an ambitious target to reduce the number of accidents and associated fatalities by half by 2024.
This comes in the wake of a 12 per cent increase in road accidents in India. In 2022, over 4.6 lakh accidents and 19 deaths were recorded every hour. According to government statistics, a significant portion of road accident fatalities result from ‘Hit from Back’, ‘Hit and Run’, and ‘Head on Collision’. Out of these, ‘Hit from Back’ or blind spot-related accidents account for the largest share.
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