that, apart from identifying potential accident-causing scenarios while driving a vehicle and alerting drivers about the same with the help of the Advance Driver Assistance System (ADAS), the project will also identify ‘greyspots’. It will be identified by data analysis and mobility analysis by continuously monitoring dynamic risks on the entire road network, the release stated.

While greyspots are locations on roads, which left unaddressed could become blackspots or the locations with fatal accidents, the system also conducts continuous monitoring of roads and designs engineering fixes to correct existing road blackspots for preventive maintenance and improved road infrastructure.

Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister for Road Transport and Shipping launched the initiative last year with an objective to reduce road accidents on Nagpur roads by 50 per cent.

The iRASTE project is under the I-Hub Foundation, IIIT Hyderabad, a Technology Innovation Hub (TIH) set up in the technology vertical - Data Banks and Data Services supported by the Department of Science and Technology (DST) under its National Mission on Interdisciplinary Cyber Physical Systems (NM-ICPS) along with INAI (Applied AI Research Institute).

The project consortium includes CSIR-CRRI and NMC, with Mahindra and Intel as the industry partners.

AI and technology is being applied to create practical solutions, as a blueprint, for Indian conditions is a unique aspect of iRASTE project. While the initial rollout of iRASTE is in Nagpur, the eventual goal is to replicate the solution in other cities too. According to the press release, talks are on with the Telangana Government to adopt the technology in a fleet of buses that ply on highways, while there are further plans to extend the scope of iRASTE to Goa and Gujarat as well.