India, March 26 -- This past week, on a school WhatsApp group, I got a reminder that it is a decade since I lost two batchmates in the space of a month to car accidents. Their names were Aseem Chaturvedi and Vikram Rusell, and while they were both taken far too soon, I hope that time has allowed their families and their friends the opportunity to grieve. This reminded me about why we should take road safety seriously. Forget everything else, forget the loss of bright and talented individuals or the economic impact of losing 1,50,000 people annually in road accidents, this reminded me about the millions of family members and friends impacted by road fatalities every year.

The events of the past 12 months will ensure that road fatalities w...