While India continues to be the top nation in terms of total fatalities from road accidents, these deaths often end up being just plain statistics that can be disputed. The data on road accidents and fatalities are released every year by two central agencies- the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) and the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). But there has been a persisting mismatch in these figures for many years, varying to the tune of thousands of deaths. The MoRTH report for 2024 says that a total of 1.77 lakh people died in road accidents across the country. Whereas the NCRB’s “Accidental deaths & suicide in India” report, released online on Wednesday (May 6), says that 1.75 lakh people died during the period. “Crime in India”, another report by the NCRB, which records deaths due to negligence relating to road accidents, shows that 1.81 lakh people lost their lives in road crashes in 2024. The mismatch is not unusual.…