A Bangladesh Road Transport Authority report revealed on Tuesday that 215 people were killed and 278 others injured in 216 road crashes between June 13 and June 24 during the last Eid journeys.
The statistics translated to an average of around 18 people killed in road crashes daily over this period
At a press briefing, held at the BRTA headquarters in Dhaka, the authority chairman Nur Mohammad Mazumder criticised a report by a non-government rights organisation on road crash data as 鈥榗onfusing鈥�.
The Road Safety Foundation published a report on Monday indicating that 262 people were killed and 543 others injured in 251 road crashes between June 11 and June 23 during Eid holidays, showing a daily death toll of around 20 people.
While presenting the BRTA report, Nur Mohammad stated that according to their statistics, 230 people were killed and 301 others injured in 235 road crashes during the same period (from June 11 to June 23).
He emphasised that the discrepancy of 32 deaths in the organisation鈥檚 report was 鈥榥ot acceptable鈥�, saying that the foundation did not inform them anything about the mismatch in the statistics and published the report.
The BRTA report detailed that between June 13 and 20, out of the total 144 fatalities, motorcycles accounted for the highest number of deaths with 50, followed by 28 in auto-rickshaws, 18 in other vehicles, 14 in trucks-covered vans, nine each in buses and easy bikes, six in cars-jeeps, four in vans, three in pickup vans and one each in microbus, tractor and ambulance crashes.
Motorcycles were involved in the highest number of crashes, constituting 23.39 per cent of the incidents.
The BRTA identified several major causes of road crashes 鈥� motorcyclists not wearing helmets, reckless driving, pedestrian negligence, and the movement of three-wheelers and illegal vehicles on highways.
Nur Mohammad noted that some fuel stations kept helmets to comply with the government鈥檚 鈥楴o helmet, no fuel鈥� policy.
He urged the public to adhere to traffic laws to reduce road crashes.
Senior BRTA officials were also present at the briefing.