Why high-powered luxury cars pose a threat to Indian pedestrians

While automotive manufacturers in India have made huge strides towards increasing the crash-worthiness of cars, a more glaring issue regarding road safety continues to remain unaddressed : pedestrian safety.

According to data compiled by Maharashtra’s Highway traffic police, 70% of fatalities on the state and highway networks in Maharashtra were of pedestrians and two-wheeler riders.

The issue seems to have taken centre-stage on social media and public forums with a rapid increase in the number of deaths occurring due to drunk or negligent driving by four-wheelers, across India.

No country for fast cars

A few years ago, a study conducted by the University of Nevada found that drivers of high-status cars are less likely to stop for pedestrians trying to cross the road, suggesting a link between owning such cars and reduced empathy. In the Indian context, the lack of empathy, arguably induced by access to fast cars, takes on a far more grim and sinister form.

Arguably, the most publicised road fatality in recent times involved a Pune-based real estate tycoon’s 17-year-old son, Vedant Agarwal, who mowed down two motorcycle-borne techies while driving a Porsche Taycan – an electric performance car with power figures surpassing 400bhp. More recently, a Noida-based car dealer hit two pedestrians in a Lamborghini Huracan supercar, with power figures exceeding 600 bhp.

Earlier in March, phone-shot footage surfaced, showing a 24-year-old Juhu resident losing control of a BMW M340i sedan –putting out upwards of 370 bhp – on Mumbai’s new Coastal Road.

Although no pedestrians were injured in the incident, it once again highlighted the fact that performance cars are a bane in the Indian landscape, not because of the way they are engineered, but because those driving these cars have not been adequately trained to handle such performance.

Back in December 2024, Australia announced a new U-Class driver’s license for South Australians owning what are labelled “Ultra High Performance Vehicles."

The license defines a UHPV as a vehicle weighing up to 4.5 tonnes (to accommodate the weight of a high-powered EVs) with a power-to-weight ratio of 340 bhp/tonne. A higher power-to-weight ratio means a car will accelerate faster, and therefore require faster reaction times. The test is purely theoretical, and consists of an online course where the driver is familiarised with the nature of supercar performance and fundamentals like countersteer, traction, throttle management, etc. Once the course is completed, applicants are required to take a test, and can retake it for no additional cost. Motorists in Australia can also be fined for turning off ADAS and driver aids like traction control, ESC, etc on public roads.

Australia is among the many developed nations actively working on updating its driver licensing tests to be in step with rapidly changing automotive technology. Simply put, it no longer takes a supercar to cause an accident, since all cars, even the best-selling ones in India, make more power than they did on average, 10-15 years ago.

In the meantime, urban infrastructure continues to decay while highways remain unregulated. While officially, India does not have the easiest driver’s license test, it has thus far proven very easy to obtain an LMV (Light Motor Vehicle) test via an RTO.

Although the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways have updated the rules regarding the procurement of a driver’s license, including securing one via a Driver Training Academy, mandating 29-hours of driver training for an LMV, and suitable test facilities for training schools, the penalties for driving without a license remains alarmingly low - ₹2000 for driving without license, and ₹25,000 if a minor is caught driving a vehicle. Statistically, there is a direct link between the difficulty of a driving test and the number of road fatalities.

The UK and Germany, for instance, witness a high rate of failure in their driving tests, so stringent and exhaustive are the theoretical and practical tests. They also have a considerably lower number of road fatalities.

How can manufacturers help?

In the face of collapsing and inadequate city and highway infrastructure, the onus once again falls on manufacturers, particularly those of high-powered vehicles, to offer track-based training programmes to teach drivers how to control a performance vehicle.

Mercedes-Benz India was the first luxury carmaker to launch its AMG Driving Academy back in 2012, following it up in 2013 with the second level of the academy, offering both basic and advanced driver training.

The course, which is available to non-AMG owners as well, for a fee, is held at the Buddh International Circuit. Apart from familiarising drivers with the skill level needed to mitigate the loss of vehicular control, such training programmes serve another purpose: pointing out that these cars are built primarily for the racetrack and, as such, can only truly be enjoyed there.

Maruti Suzuki currently has a network of 540 driving schools across the country. It also offers extensive training (ranging between 21 to 26 hours) for a nominal fee, not exceeding ₹7500. It includes everything from Simulator training, theoretical and practical tests, etc.

However, for the tests to work, the infrastructure in the country has to be consistent and dependable. Indian drivers monitor their surroundings far more than they do traffic signals, as the possibility of someone else violating those rules remains high. No driver training program can account for the infinite variables thrown at the driver, but India’s urban and semi-urban landscape.

For its part, MoRTH has also issued a policy to set up driver training institutes across the country, with an outlay of ₹4500 crore, to be used in a phased manner to set up 1600 institutes across 36 states and UTs. At present, only 28 functional government-run driver training programmes exist.

Using predictive AI as a solution

Although not-for-profit agencies like the Save Life Foundation have highlighted many accident-prone hotspots across India’s highway network, AI-based predictive tools can be deployed in multiple ways to reduce fatalities.

For starters, AI can analyse historical accident data, weather conditions, road infrastructure, and traffic flow to predict high-risk zones and suggest preventive measures.

AI-driven models can also identify accident-prone areas (black spots) and provide insights for authorities to take corrective actions like improved lighting, speed control, or better signage. AI can also process data from CCTV cameras and drones to detect violations like signal jumps and reckless driving, leading to timely enforcement.