The much-awaited 6 airbags rule, which was to come into place from October 1, 2022, is now pushed to October 1, 2023, Nitin Gadkari announced. The Minister for Road Transport & Highways (MoRTH) in the Government of India said the delay is on account of a lack of airbag manufacturing capacity in India to handle the transition. The government had earlier issued a draft notification on January 14, 2022, that mandated vehicles of category M1 (vehicles with up to 8 seats) manufactured after October 1, 2022, to have mandatory 6 airbags.
He added, “Safety of all passengers travelling in motor vehicles irrespective of their cost and variants is the foremost priority," said Gadkari. "Considering the global supply chain constraints being faced by the auto industry and its impact on the macroeconomic scenario, it has been decided to implement the proposal mandating a minimum of 6 Airbags in Passenger Cars (M-1 Category) w.e.f 01st October 2023.”
The renewed push comes after Cyrus Mistry, the former chairman of Indian conglomerate Tata Sons, died in a car crash on Sunday, reigniting the road safety debate in the world's fourth-largest car market. The draft rules were made public in January and were expected to be finalised a month later, but they are facing resistance from some car makers who say it will increase vehicle prices.
The government is also planning to make it mandatory for car makers to install an alarm system for rear seat belts to enforce their use and will audit all national highways to make them safer. Gadkari said he hopes the efforts will halve road accidents and deaths by the end of 2024. More than 150,000 people died in over 500,000 road accidents in India in 2021, Gadkari said.
In 2020 more than 133,000 people were killed in 355,000 road accidents, government data showed. About 3 million cars are sold in India each year, and car passengers accounted for 13 per cent of the deaths in 2020. The ministry estimates that having airbags, along with seat belts, would have saved the lives of at least one-third of the 39,000 people who died in road accidents in 2020 due to head-on or side collisions.
