[vishwaschettri]

Originally Posted by IamNikhil

How is there culpability here, I fail to understand?

Basis the judicial stance in India in case of motor vehicle accidents, larger vehicle is always considered to be at fault and car driver would be tried if there is a case / complain lodged in this scenario.

FIR would always be filed against the larger vehicle driver only.

Car driver will have to plead guilty and pay a small fine in court to be acquitted. A seperate case for compensation will drag on for years, I hope the vehicle was insured.

With that assumption the larger vehicle is always at 100% fault in India even if you have irrefutable evidence to prove your innocence.

Cheers

[IamNikhil]

Originally Posted by binand

At 3 seconds into the video the car is approx one car-length behind the tractor. At 6 seconds into the video (the instant of impact) the car is abreast of the tractor. Based on this observation, I have to disagree on your conclusions above.

...The car was also not driving within the parameters of the law. See the extract from the Rules Of The Road Regulations, above - the car was in violation of that.

I respectfully disagree. There has to be a distinction made between overspeeding & accelerating. Also, how are you concluding that the car was being driven "rashly" in this case? If one encounters a slow-moving tractor in front his vehicle, any sane driver would look for an opportunity to accelerate and overtake; albeit with enough caution. From what is clearly evident in the video, nowhere does it seem that the car driver has acted "irresponsibly"; since he definitely didn't have any super-human capability of predicting someone dashing into his car from a random angle! Also, the car driver must have definitely estimated the traffic flow coming in from the right direction, since it's a junction and would have paid attention largely to that.

[Meph1st0]

The bike rider is at fault here. 1.) Driving on the wrong side, 2.) recklessly crossing the road.

If there is a signal, the bike rider should have waited for it. If there is no signal, then he cannot cross the road. He has to go ahead, reach the rightmost lane, and execute a U-turn only. It is very risky crossing a 3-lane road.
The opening on the road is there for U-turns only, it is not an intersection.

The car driver does not seem to be overspeeding and it is a 6-lane road. He could also be focusing on the auto in the opposite direction which was arriving at the opening to execute a U-turn.

[Neil Roy]

Originally Posted by binand

In India the relevant code is Rules Of The Road Regulations, 1989. Its regulation #8 says:

"The driver of a motor vehicle shall slow down when approaching a road intersection, a road junction, pedestrian crossing or a road corner, and shall not enter any such intersection, junction or crossing until he has become aware that he may do so without endangering the safety of persons thereon."

If there was ever an explanation for "devil's advocate"..
So, if someone jumps of a high rise building and falls on a moving car during a crossing or an intersection of a junction, does that mean that the said motor vehicle has endangered the safety of persons?

[Ice]

The car driver is not at fault, but he could have avoided this incident if he had been a little more watchful. It isn’t about what he did, it’s about what he probably didn’t do.

But to set things straight :

1. The motorcyclist is a moron. None of my observations take that away from him.

2. I don’t think the car sped up to overtake. It looked like the tractor slowed down, seeing the motorcyclist.


What could the car have done differently ?
It is always advisable to hang back and check the left lane of the vehicle you are overtaking on the right, before committing to the overtake. This is to insure yourself against the vehicle being overtaken swerving right for some reason (say, a cow) while you’re beside it. It’s tougher to do this when the vehicle is much slower, like a tractor, but the action is still demanded if the overtaking vehicle wants to be 100% safe. The art of defensive driving involved anticipating others’ mistakes, and this one action has helped me this far.

What could the car have done while overtaking?
A. Hang back and check the extreme left like I’ve outlined above, and,
B. Honk generously.

The car driver may just have saved himself the trouble that is sure to follow, if he had done both, or even just A (he would have seen the motorcyclist then).

[sarathlal]

Originally Posted by FLYBOYSID

Unfortunately people will never understand the perils of driving on the wrong side and logic behind rules of the road. The car driver will be hassled for no fault of his.

The reason for this situation to never improve is primarily due to lack of consequence to the person causing such an accident. As you might have seen in the ensuing comments, you would have got a glimpse on how the law is going to go after the car driver and not the bike rider.
Insurance also works like this only. Everyone will take stance that bigger vehicle is at fault. The biker is never going to bear the consequence of the mess he has caused (Other than the physical suffering he has to go through).

There is a worse case situation than this as well. Imagine the car driver had swerved off onto the opposite lane and hit an oncoming car. The biker would not have been aware of the bloodbath he might have created.

With so much video evidence available these days, law should be changed to properly investigate and extract financial liability from the real accident causing driver. Then maybe someday reckless drivers causing accidents might become a rarity than a routine.

[binand]

Originally Posted by Neil Roy

So, if someone jumps of a high rise building and falls on a moving car during a crossing or an intersection of a junction, does that mean that the said motor vehicle has endangered the safety of persons?

I suppose you are being facetious here.

Originally Posted by Ice

The car driver is not at fault, but he could have avoided this incident if he had been a little more watchful. It isn’t about what he did, it’s about what he probably didn’t do...

Exactly - you have captured the essence of what I was saying. Just that I'd go a step further, that he has a responsibility to have done all those things.

Originally Posted by MT_Hyderabad

Let us say that a person jumps in front of moving vehicles to commit suicide. Unfortunately, one of the vehicles in front of which he landed was overspeeding (let's say well beyond the prescribed limit may be 150 km/hr on a 100 km/hr limit). Who is responsible for this accident?
You can say 75/25. But the reality is, that it is the person who jumped is 100% responsible. This poor driver was overspeeding and should be penalised for that offence, not for killing this suicidal person.

This is a strawman. But since you brought it up, yes - the overspeeding driver is responsible for this death and must be prosecuted.

Anyway, I am convinced in my viewpoint and apparently others are in an opposing viewpoint. This twain is unlikely to meet, so this is the last I'm going to post on this particular topic.

[Anonymous guy]

A vehicle burned down at palm beach road (Navi Mumbai) today, couldn't click any pictures but the car in question was an old Santro

[true_sedan]

Originally Posted by binand

Wouldn't be too hasty to jump to that conclusion; the location looks like at least a T junction with a break in median. The car driver should have known better to not overtake the tractor while passing through such a spot.

See, we have one person right here in our forum who thinks the car driver was wrong. I see no hope for the future other than to just sell the car and stay safe from people who think the above accident is car divers fault.

[venkyhere]

Originally Posted by binand

"The driver of a motor vehicle shall slow down when approaching a road intersection, a road junction, pedestrian crossing or a road corner, and shall not enter any such intersection, junction or crossing until he has become aware that he may do so without endangering the safety of persons thereon."

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

Brilliant. Succinctly put, in very plain language, thirty years ago.

If only the drivers on our roads new and practised this. But I doubt that they ever will

Since the discussion is down to legal-eagle type arguments, here goes :

Car was driving at 60, approached junction, slowed down to 40, once he saw that the junction is clear, accelerated to 50. Meanwhile, a tractor was going at 20 kph on the left lane.

Suppose instead of accelerating back to 50, he had stayed at 40 kph itself, but still 'happened to overtake, despite not intending to' the tractor just near the exit of the junction, purely vide the constant speed difference, and still collided with that moron biker , what would be his culpability according to this law ? He has slowed down, according to the law. The law doesn't say he has to slow down to 'same speed as the slowest vehicle in the vicinity of the junction'.

Now what ? the 'law' is nothing but brilliantly ambiguous. Like so many other laws.

[deathwalkr]

The way i see it, it's simple.

We are all looking at this as if the car hit the biker.

No.

The biker went and hit the car in all his wisdom and sense.

[gauravdgr8]

Originally Posted by HIGHWAY_PATROL

It does seem like a junction with traffic lights. The biker is not even wearing a helmet. Very very careless of him to ride like that. Seeing him lying on the ground motionless is very disturbing. One only hopes he survived.

Absolutely no fault of the car driver. The bike is driving in the wrong side, crossing in a non-sensical manner.

[Small Bot]

I just finished reading all of the above points.

I have been in almost the same situation in 2021 and have the court summons from a Chennai court and the fine I paid, to prove it. I was initially accused of hit-and-run even though I took the lady to hospital and waited till her family came before leaving (accused by the police who wanted bribes and not by the biker's family). In the end, because of two eyewitness accounts (and some inevitable palm-greasing), I was let off and charged only with Reckless Driving, so that the biker could claim medical insurance for her emergency surgery. The larger vehicle is generally charged like that, but it doesn't make it my fault at all.

When you're overtaking a moving vehicle from the right, you don't really expect somebody to drive across perpendicular to you. There is zero chance of predicting it.

I respect the opinions of those who believe that this could have been avoided. I also respectfully offer my opinion that the members who say this, might not have been able to fully avoid the accident themselves. The degree of the impact might have differed - some members might have braked a bit earlier and just grazed the bike, and some might have hit the bike a lot harder than this too. I wonder if I personally could have avoided hitting the biker if I were the car driver in the video, and I'm really not sure.

That said, I hope that since there's footage, the car driver is not harassed for no fault of his. The biker landed so hard it made me wince while watching. I don't feel optimistic about that..

[saubi2299]

Originally Posted by binand

Wouldn't be too hasty to jump to that conclusion; the location looks like at least a T junction with a break in median. The car driver should have known better to not overtake the tractor while passing through such a spot.

Well, such expectations will make everyone quit driving. Car had crossed the T junction, was in right lane, and if he is expected to not attempt an overtake even there, better to put a speed limiter at 10 kmph

[Joe367]

Originally Posted by IamNikhil

Biker tries to cross lanes without due regard for oncoming traffic, gets hit by a car. Such instances have become increasingly common.

Yes, I've a lot of people doing this on bikes and scooters. Instead of stopping, looking both sides and crossing - they just drive along the wrong side for a while and then suddenly crosses the road without warning. I wonder how much time they save with this maneuver risking their lives.