Kochi, Sep 11 (PTI) Nearly 6,000 people have died in road accidents since January last year in Kerala, which records more than 40,000 such incidents annually. Yet, the state has not rolled out a central government scheme designed to reward ordinary citizens who step forward to save lives.

Official sources said the Good Samaritan scheme, introduced in 2020 by the Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, was meant to encourage bystanders to rush accident victims to hospital without fear of harassment.

According to them, the need for such an initiative is evident in Kerala, where police data show that 48,834 accidents were reported last year, leaving 3,880 dead and 54,796 injured. In just the first seven months of this year alone, 28,724 accidents have already claimed 2,107 lives and injured 32,569 people, they said.

The Good Samaritan scheme was later renamed Rah-Veer after the government increased the cash reward earlier this year. In 2021, the ministry directed all states to put the plan into action, calling it crucial for helping victims in the “golden hour” — the first 60 minutes after an accident, when medical attention can make the difference between life and death.

Initially, the reward was fixed at Rs 5,000 along with a certificate. In April this year, the Centre revised the amount to Rs 25,000 per case and also announced national awards of Rs 1 lakh each for 10 Good Samaritans annually.

According to the guidelines, rescuers are to be given an acknowledgement either by the police or the hospital, which must then be reviewed by a district appraisal committee headed by the District Collector.

Based on its recommendation, the Transport Commissioner should release the reward and a state-level monitoring committee, under the Principal Secretary (Home) is tasked with overseeing the implementation.

However, despite these provisions, not a single person has been rewarded in Kerala over the past five years. The state government constituted a monitoring committee in March 2022 and reconstituted it on July 28 this year after the renaming of the scheme. But both the state-and district-level committees remain non-functional.

Kerala Transport Commissioner Nagaraju Chilakam admitted that the scheme is yet to take off. “It is a very good scheme. Unfortunately, we haven’t received any proposals from the district-level yet. I am not aware whether anyone has been rewarded under it,” he told PTI.

The Transport Commissioner stated that it is a reimbursement scheme in which the state initially provides a cash award, which is later reimbursed by the central government.

“Perhaps people at the ground level, especially in the health department and police, are unaware of the scheme. If implemented, it would certainly encourage people to provide immediate emergency care to accident victims,” he added.

A district regional transport officer also said that hospital authorities or police have not reported about Good Samaritans. “There are district-level committees that exist even though they have not reported Good Samaritans yet. We haven’t come across any case where the police issued an acknowledgment to a Good Samaritan who came under our review. In Kerala, people rush accident victims to hospitals, but due to their lack of awareness about the scheme, they never ask hospitals and police about the acknowledgment given as part of the scheme,” the officer said.

Adding another dimension, former international car rally driver and road safety expert Upendra Narayan, who has worked with the Kerala and Tamil Nadu police, stressed that prevention should take precedence over post-accident rewards. “I know about the Good Samaritan project. But for me, prevention is better than cure. The best option is to prevent accidents rather than reward people after they occur,” he said.

According to him, one of the key reasons for accidents is the mismatch between high-speed vehicles and Indian road design. “We have vehicles that can touch 200 km per hour, while our roads are designed for cruising at around 130 km per hour. Either the roads should be upgraded or vehicles rolled out should match our road specifications,” he pointed out. He also emphasised the need to integrate road safety into school education.

“Students should be taught traffic rules and etiquette from a young age. They should be practically trained on how to walk and cross roads. Also, children should be encouraged to attend to accident victims. This alone can help reduce accidents and fatality by at least 40 per cent,” Narayan said.

According to the Union Ministry of Road Transport, the Good Samaritan law allows a person to voluntarily come forward to administer immediate assistance or emergency care to a person injured in an accident, or crash, or emergency medical condition.

“Good Samaritan law protects Good Samaritans from harassment on the actions being taken by them to save the life of the road accident victims,” according to the Road Transport and Highways Ministry website. PTI TBA TGB VGN