DEMYSTIFYING VEHICULAR SAFETY: THE FUNDAMENTALS OF ENGINEERING A SAFE VEHICLE

SJ R Kutty, Chief Sustainability Officer and Head-Vehicle Attributes & Technical Services, Tata Motors

ROAD ACCIDENTS ACCOUNT FOR ONE OF THE causes of death in the world claiming nearly 1.3 million lives each year. India itself accounts for 11 percent of global death in road accidents. Hence road safety and its awareness become a critical issue for the prevention of accidents. The Government of India is focusing on 4Es of road safety, namely Engineering, Education, Enforcement, and Emergency Care. The United Nations, in its Decade of Action for Road Safety 2021-2030, has set an ambitious target of preventing at least 50 percent of road traffic deaths and injuries by 2030.

Our roads can be made safer by deploying updated regulations as well as innovative interventions by OEMs/ automobile companies who constantly work on enhancing the safety of their products by making sustainable investments in accident research. Continuous research is imperative to come up with technologies and design of safer products or safety features in products. Tata Motors has been one of the early movers in the automobile industry with respect to making investments for establishing state-of-the-art digital and physical product development processes manned by the best minds in terms of road safety in the country. The endeavour to build a safe vehicle is a complex and meticulous process that requires constant coordination between multiple parties. Here we demystify some of the crucial steps for making safer vehicles for tomorrow.

Covering grounds: The various aspects of vehicular safety