JUDGMENT

Madan B. Lokur, J.

1. In this petition under Article 32 of the Constitution Dr. S. Rajaseekaran, an orthopaedic surgeon, a public spirited citizen and President of the Indian Orthopaedic Association has, inter alia, prayed for enforcement of road safety norms and appropriate treatment of accident victims.

2. The petitioner states that in his capacity as Chairman and Head of Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Ganga Hospital, Coimbatore, he witnesses daily, the acute loss of life and limbs caused by road accidents. He suggests that practical measures need to be taken in a time-bound and expeditious manner to give effect to legislations, reports and recommendations for ensuring that the loss of lives due to road accidents is minimized. The petitioner estimates that 90% of the problem of deaths due to road accidents is the result of a lack of strict enforcement of safety rules on roads and strict punishment for those who do not obey rules. The petitioner has relied upon data published in December 2011 by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways in its publication captioned „Road Accidents in India 2010? to indicate that the number of road accidents is increasing every year and that unfortunately more than half the victims are in the economically active age group of 25-65 years.

3. Since the petitioner has no personal interest in the matter, the writ petition filed by him was taken up as a public interest litigation.

4. Initially, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways opposed the writ petition but as the litigation progressed, the matter was looked at in a non-adversarial manner and considered as one in public interest.

5. In view of the non-adversarial stance of the Government of India, this Court passed an order on 22nd April, 2014 constituting a Committee on Road Safety under the Chairmanship of Justice K. S. Radhakrishnan, a former judge of this Court. The Committee was notified by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) of the Government of India on 30th May, 2014 and orders finalizing the terms and conditions of appointment of the Chairperson and Members of the Committee were issued on 8th August, 2014.

6. In compliance with the orders of this Court and notwithstanding bureaucratic delays and without having been provided adequate infrastructure and staff, the Committee commenced its work in earnest from 15th/16th May, 2014. The Committee has since submitted 12 reports to this Court but it is not necessary at present to deal with all these reports.

7. On 10th April, 2015 we recognized the exemplary work being done by the Committee and expressed the view that its recommendations need to be seriously discussed and debated. This was in the context of the fact that the number of deaths due to road accidents in the country was said to be over 100,000 in a year, which translates to about one death every three minutes and that the compensation awarded for deaths and other motor accident claims runs into hundreds of crores of rupees.

8. However, it appeared to us that various State Governments were not responding positively to the recommendations made by the Committee and accordingly the Secretary of the MoRTH was directed to call a meeting of his counterparts from all the States and Union Territories on or before 31st May, 2015 to deliberate on the reports prepared by the Committee as well as its recommendations, their implementation and further measures that could be taken.

9. We also noted that despite the lapse of a considerable period of time, the Government of India was unable to provide adequate facilities to the Committee even though a letter was sent by the learned Attorney General for India on 19th December, 2014 to the Revenue Secretary and the Urban Development Secretary