Page 8 - Insurance Times December 2023

and the Ministry of Road Transport and "A total of 4,61,312 road accidents in 2022, which is more than the
Highways to organize a special drive. have been reported by states and 1,53,972 reported in 2021.
"Several critical issues having implica- Union Territories (UTs) during the cal- According to the research, there were
tions for the general insurance sector" endar year 2022, which claimed 4,61,312 accidents nationwide in
1,68,491 lives and caused injuries to
were discussed during a meeting pre- 2022. Of them, 1,51,997 (32.9%) hap-
4,43,366 persons."The research titled
sided over by DFS secretary Vivek Joshi, pened on National Highways (NH),
which included the General Insurance 'Road accidents in India -- 2022' stated which include expressways; 1,06,682
Council and the CEOs of private sector that this represents an increase of (23.1%) happened on state highways;
general insurance companies. 11.9% in accidents, 9.4% in fatalities, and the rest 2,02,633 (43.9%) hap-
and 15.3% in injuries over the previous
In order to accelerate the expansion of year. pened on other roads.
health insurance, Joshi also requested "Out of the total of 1,68,491 fatalities
According to the research, young
that the private insurers work with the reported in 2022, 61,038 (36.2 per
people in the productive age groups
Ministry of Health to expand cashless fa- cent) were on national highways,
made up the majority of the fatal road
cilities and standardize treatment costs. 41,012 (24.3 per cent) were on state
accident casualties in 2022-for the highways and 66,441 (39.4 per cent)
Road accidents up 12% fourth year in a row. were on other roads," it stated.
year over year to 4.6 lakh, The survey stated that "young adults
in the age group of 18 - 45 years ac- First insurance surety
with 19 fatalities each counted for 66.5 per cent of victims
hour: Report during 2022," and that 83.4 per cent bond accepted by NHAI as
of all road accident fatalities are those bid security
In 2022, there were over 4.6 lakh road
accidents in India, accounting for the in the working age group of 18 - 60 The government-run National High-
years.
worrisome 12 percent increase in fa- ways Authority of India (NHAI) said that
talities per hour, as reported by the By 2024, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari it has approved an insurance surety
Ministry of Road Transport and High- wants to cut the number of accidents bond for the first time in order to pro-
ways (MoRTH). 53 traffic accidents and deaths that come from them in ceed with the monetisation plan of the
occur in the nation per hour, accord- half. States and territories reported forthcoming Toll Operate Transfer
ing to the research. 1,68,491 road accident deaths in total (TOT) Bundle 14 bid.
This will be the first time that the road
infrastructure industry uses this cut-
Sunak: World's first AI safety institute to be set up
ting-edge tool as a bank guarantee
in UK (BG) to monetarily support bids. To

UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak made the announcement in a speech in Lon- carry out this project, NHAI has been
don that the UK will serve as the home base for the first AI Safety Institute, collaborating closely with SBI General
as the nation takes the lead in researching and testing novel forms of artifi- Insurance, AON India Insurance, and
cial intelligence. the Highway Operators Association of
India (HOAI), according to NHAI.
If this is done incorrectly, AI may make the development of chemical or bio-
logical weapons simpler. AI might be used by terrorist organizations to wreak Without any buffer money, the insurer
even more havoc and terror. According to Sunak, criminals might utilize AI has provided an insurance surety bond
for fraud, disinformation campaigns, cyberattacks, or even child sex abuse. for the NHAI monetisation bid of TOT
bundle 14 at a rate of 0.25 percent.
He went so far as to discuss the "most unlikely and extreme fears around AI,
According to it, concessionaires will
which is sometimes referred to as super intelligence," such as the possibility benefit greatly from this, which will
that mankind could completely lose control over technology.
increase market liquidity and create
People shouldn't be losing sleep over this risk at this time. I wish to avoid an atmosphere that will support the
seeming alarmist. There is a lot of discussion regarding this, and some ex- expansion and development of the
perts believe it won't happen at all. However hazy and implausible these road industry.
possibilities may seem, Sunak stated that the repercussions would be grave
The sector will be held to a new stan-
if they materialized.
dard when insurance surety bonds are
8 December 2023 The Insurance Times