New Delhi, Sep 19 (IANS) Advertisements should not glamorise over-speeding but rather emphasise on safety measures like wearing of crash helmets and seat belts, said Road Transport Minister T.R. Baalu here Tuesday.

"One of the important reasons for road accidents is over-speeding," Baalu said at a seminar on 'Auto Retail: Framework for Growth', co-organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci) here.

Advertisements should help spread road safety messages to help bring about a reduction in accidents, he said.

In 2004, an estimated 92,000 people were killed in over 400,000 road accidents in the country.

According to Baalu, the number of motor vehicles had increased at a great pace and was set to touch 70 million by March next year.

Accidents lead to a loss of two-three percent of India's gross domestic product.

"The induction of new generation and high-speed vehicles is not enough. We shall have to ensure safety of our drivers and other road users. This is of paramount importance and should not be lost sight of," he emphasised.

Ficci's past president Onkar S. Kanwar, speaking of the cumbersome process for registering cars through regional transport offices, called for direct registration by dealers of new and used cars.

He suggested that the policy for old vehicles, by defining the age of commercial vehicles, must be scrapped. He proposed uniformity of road tax, reduction in service tax on repairs and provision of land for auto malls and auto zones.

He said his ministry had taken the initiative to provide software for computerisation of all regional transport offices in the country to be able to deal with the vehicle registration procedure efficiently.

State governments should take steps to computerise the transport offices to facilitate uniformity of records and expedite the transfer of vehicles, he said. He lamented that the progress in this regard was not very encouraging.