Road traffic accident is one of the leading causes of death in the world and India. Road safety is a paramount challenge for India as it is required to comply with the target set by the United Nations to reduce road accidents by at least half by 2030. In the wake of this, the article addresses two pertinent questions: (a) what risk factors cause road traffic accidents? (b) How should policy measures be drawn with systematic and data-driven studies to prevent road accidents? The article uses both explorative and econometric analysis to analyse the road accident data of several states and union territories of India over the period 2014–2018. Using the panel approach, the study finds that over-speeding is the most important factor that causes road accidents. The other significant factors of road accidents are found to be overloading, wrong-side driving, commercial place and faulty road design. Among other findings, drunken driving is found to be a major driver of rural accidents in India. The findings of the article have important policy implications.
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