When Familiarity Becomes Risk: The Behaviour Gap in Road Safety

“The road was familiar. The mistake was small. The impact was permanent.”

A few years ago, during an incident review, a driver said:

“Sir, I drive on this road every day. I didn’t think anything would happen.”

It did.

That sentence reflects the real road safety challenge in India—not awareness, but behaviour.

As per the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways, over 1.68 lakh people lose their lives on Indian roads every year—more than 460 fatalities every day. Most are linked to human factors such as speeding, distraction, fatigue, and poor hazard anticipation.

We talk a lot about helmets, seat belts, and policies—and rightly so. But experience across manufacturing sites, logistics operations, and corporate travel programs shows one truth:

“Rules create compliance. Habits create safety.”

This is why defensive driving matters. It is not about driving slower; it is about driving consciously—anticipating others’ mistakes, managing fatigue and emotions, and making deliberate choices instead of reactive ones.

Organizations that move beyond awareness posters and invest in practical, behaviour-based road safety learning consistently see fewer incidents, lower costs, and safer people.

This Road Safety Month, a simple question can make a real difference:

Are our people trained only to follow rules—or to survive real roads?

If road safety is a concern for your teams, drivers, or contractors, a short conversation can often reveal where risks truly lie.

Because every incident prevented is not a statistic avoided—

it is a life that safely returns home.