Adapting DMS Technology to Handle Unstructured Traffic and Diverse Behavior

Indian roads are among the busiest and most challenging in the world, with a unique mix of vehicles, pedestrians, and unpredictable traffic patterns. Unfortunately, this complexity makes India one of the countries with the highest road accident death rates globally. Many of these accidents are linked to driver inattentiveness, fatigue, or distraction, making road safety a critical concern. According to the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways road accidents in India 2022 report, over 160,000 fatalities were recorded last year, underscoring the urgent need for Driver Monitoring Systems (DMS) solutions.

Did you know:

According to the World Health Organization, India accounts for 11% of global road fatalities, despite having only 1% of the world’s vehicles.
Driver fatigue contributes to 10-25% of all road crashes in India, as highlighted by the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways’ draft on the Driver Drowsiness and Attention Warning System.
In Australia, fatigue-related crashes make up 20% of serious accidents, while in the U.S., it’s around 16-20%.
Countries with strong road safety measures, like Sweden, report significantly lower fatality rates, with just 1.9 road deaths per 100,000 people.

In this context, Driver Monitoring Systems have emerged as a critical solution to improve road safety. As India modernizes its road safety infrastructure, widespread adoption of DMS can significantly reduce fatalities and promote safer driving habits.

DMS offers a promising solution to tackle these challenges, using advanced technology to monitor driver behavior and prevent accidents before they happen.

Understanding Driver Monitoring Systems

A Driver Monitoring System (DMS) is an advanced in-vehicle safety feature that combines technologies like AI, computer vision, and sensors to monitor and analyze a driver’s behavior in real-time. By detecting signs of fatigue, drowsiness, or distractions, and analyzing facial expressions, eye activity, and head movements, the system can issue alerts or activate safety mechanisms to prevent potential accidents. Additionally, sensors track driver attentiveness, ensuring that when risks are detected, timely interventions are made to enhance overall driving safety.

Key Features of a DMS:

Facial recognition and eye-tracking can detect yawning, prolonged eye closure, head tilting, or whether the driver is wearing glasses or sunglasses.
Behavioral analysis can determine if the driver is wearing a seatbelt, has both hands on the wheel, or is holding a phone—indicating potential distraction.
Emotional analysis can assess facial expressions to detect stress, anger, frustration, fatigue, or drowsiness, determining if a driver is too impaired to drive safely and reducing the risk of accidents.
Occupant detection ensures safety for everyone in the vehicle, identifying passengers (including children or pets) in both the front and back seats to trigger appropriate safety measures.
Gaze detection can assess whether the driver is focused on the road or distracted by the dashboard, radio, or infotainment system.
Real-time alerts provide immediate warnings if risky behavior is detected, helping drivers stay aware and reducing the likelihood of accidents.

How Driver Monitoring Systems Strengthen ADAS for Safer Roads

A standalone DMS is effective, but its true potential is unlocked when integrated into Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS). Here’s how this integration enhances overall vehicle safety:

Adaptive Assistance: DMS data can be used to adjust ADAS features dynamically. For example, if the system detects driver fatigue, it can trigger lane-keeping assistance or adaptive cruise control.
Automated Warnings and Interventions: By syncing with braking and steering control systems, DMS can initiate alerts or take corrective actions if the driver is unresponsive.
Behavior-based Personalization: ADAS can learn a driver’s typical behavior and adjust sensitivity levels for alerts accordingly, reducing false alarms and improving user experience.
Fleet and Commercial Vehicle Safety: Integrated DMS-ADAS solutions particularly benefit commercial fleets, helping monitor driver performance and reduce accident risks.

As automotive technology advances, combining DMS with ADAS will be critical in paving the way for safer roads in India and beyond. Manufacturers and developers must prioritize seamless integration to ensure both technologies work in harmony.

AI and ML in Driver Monitoring Systems

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) are at the core of modern DMS.. These technologies enable real-time detection of driver behavior, drowsiness, and distractions, ensuring enhanced safety on the road. Developers working on DMS solutions should focus on the following key aspects:

Robust Training Data: High-quality and diverse datasets are crucial for training AI models to accurately detect driver states across different demographics, lighting conditions, and driving environments.
Edge AI for Real-time Processing: Implementing AI models on edge devices reduces latency, enabling faster response times without relying on cloud processing.
Bias Mitigation: Developers must ensure that AI models are inclusive and free from biases related to age, gender, or ethnicity to provide accurate monitoring for all drivers.
Multimodal Inputs: Combining video, infrared sensors, and physiological signals (like heart rate or eye movement) can significantly improve accuracy and reliability.
Regulatory Compliance: Adhering to global and regional safety standards ensures that the system meets legal requirements and gains user trust.

Current Adoption of DMS in India

Customer Perspective

Fleet operators and commercial vehicle owners are increasingly adopting DMS to minimize risks, enhance safety, and lower insurance costs. India’s ADAS market is expected to grow from USD 2.97 billion in 2025 to USD 6.89 billion by 2030, with a CAGR of 18.33%, driven by rising road safety awareness and technological advancements. However, private passenger vehicle buyers remain hesitant due to the price sensitivity of the Indian market and the additional cost of incorporating DMS.

Companies and Manufacturers Leading the Way

BharatBenz: Integrated Driver State Monitoring Systems into heavy-duty trucks, aiming to address fatigue-related accidents.
Rosmerta Technologies: Unveiled an AI-based DMS solution at the Bharat Mobility Global Expo 2024, indicating a growing interest in AI-powered safety technologies.
Emerging Players: Automakers like Tata Motors and Mahindra are actively exploring DMS integration in vehicles tailored for Indian driving conditions.

Challenges in Adopting Driver Monitoring Systems in India

India’s bustling roads reflect its vibrant economy and growing mobility needs, but the increasing traffic density also brings challenges like frequent congestion and higher accident risks. DMS has the potential to significantly enhance road safety, but its adoption is still in its early stages. Despite its potential, widespread adoption of DMS faces several roadblocks:

Cost Sensitivity: The cost of integrating DMS into vehicles is a significant deterrent, especially in India’s highly price-sensitive market. Budget-conscious fleet operators and passenger vehicle owners often prioritize affordability over advanced safety features.
Infrastructure Limitations: Infrastructure limitations in rural areas, including scarce maintenance services and lack of technical support, make DMS deployment challenging and reduce system efficiency. Uneven roads, potholes, and inconsistent traffic signals further hinder ADAS performance. In such conditions, DMS helps by providing real-time driver behavior data, allowing vehicle systems to adapt warnings and assist features for safer driving.
Privacy Concerns: Real-time driver monitoring, a core feature of DMS, raises valid concerns about data security and surveillance ethics. Many individuals worry about how their personal data will be used, stored, or shared, creating resistance to widespread implementation.
Complex and Unstructured Traffic: Indian roads witness a mix of pedestrians, cyclists, auto-rickshaws, and vehicles moving unpredictably. Unlike structured highway systems in developed countries, lane discipline is often weak, making it harder for ADAS to function reliably. DMS can bridge this gap by ensuring driver attentiveness, issuing alerts when manual intervention is needed, and complementing ADAS decision-making in chaotic environments.
Technological Adaptation and Calibration: DMS technology, primarily developed for structured environments, requires significant adaptation for Indian driving conditions.
- Sensor Calibration: The need for frequent calibration of sensors to adapt to the dynamic Indian road conditions poses a significant challenge. Misalignment can lead to incorrect data interpretation, reducing system reliability.
- Localization of Algorithms: DMS algorithms trained on Western driving patterns need extensive retraining to recognize behaviors unique to Indian roads, such as frequent honking, weaving through traffic, and unpredictable pedestrian crossings.
Data Scarcity for Machine Learning: Machine learning models require diverse, high-quality datasets to improve DMS accuracy. However, the lack of annotated Indian driving data affects the system’s ability to detect fatigue, distraction, and other risk factors accurately. The effectiveness of DMS relies on extensive data for machine learning, but the scarcity of high-quality, annotated data reflecting Indian driving scenarios limits the training and refinement of these systems.
Weather and Visibility Challenges: India’s monsoons, dense fog, and dust storms reduce visibility, impacting sensor accuracy in both ADAS and DMS. Poor lighting conditions and faded road markings further reduce system efficiency. DMS, however, remains effective in low visibility by continuously assessing driver alertness, ensuring they stay engaged even when external sensors face limitations.
Affordability and Market Adoption: While full-fledged ADAS remains expensive, DMS offers a cost-effective way to enhance road safety by monitoring human behavior rather than relying solely on external sensors. As regulatory bodies push for stricter safety norms, DMS integration in commercial and passenger vehicles may become a necessary safety feature.

Regulatory Landscape

Currently, India lacks specific regulations mandating the adoption of DMS in vehicles. However, supportive government policies could play a crucial role in overcoming the barriers to adoption. Measures such as tax benefits for vehicles equipped with advanced safety technologies, subsidies for fleet operators adopting DMS, and penalties for non-compliance with road safety norms could significantly accelerate the integration of these systems across the country.

Addressing These Challenges

To drive adoption, collaboration between automakers, policymakers, and technology providers will be key. Reducing hardware costs through localized manufacturing, increasing awareness campaigns on DMS benefits, and implementing privacy-first AI models can help build trust and encourage adoption. Additionally, government incentives and stricter road safety regulations will be instrumental in making DMS a standard feature rather than an optional add-on.

Potential Impact of DMS on Road Safety in India

As India moves towards smarter and safer roads, large-scale adoption of Driver Monitoring Systems can create long-term structural improvements in road safety and traffic management.

Scaling Road Safety Nationwide: Unlike individual accident prevention, nationwide DMS adoption—especially in fleets, public transport, and ride-hailing services—can systematically lower fatigue-related and distraction-induced crashes, reducing the country’s high road fatality rate.
Policy-Driven Road Safety Improvements: Aggregated DMS data can help governments and regulatory bodies analyze accident hotspots, assess road risk factors, and develop data-backed traffic laws that improve infrastructure planning and enforcement.
Enabling Smarter Transport Ecosystems: DMS is foundational in integrating India’s transition to connected and autonomous vehicles (ADAS) by providing real-time driver behavior data that enhances semi-autonomous driving safety.
Long-Term Cultural Shift in Driving Behavior: Continuous DMS monitoring can contribute to nationwide improvements in road discipline, encouraging safer habits through incentive-based compliance programs and corporate safety initiatives in commercial fleets.

The Future of DMS in India

AI-Powered Customization: Future advancements in AI are paving the way for DMS solutions tailored to India’s unique driving conditions. These systems can be optimized to detect and address driving behaviors specific to chaotic and mixed-traffic environments, making them more effective in preventing accidents.
Smart City Integration: With India increasingly focusing on smart city initiatives, integrating DMS into the broader urban mobility framework can enhance road safety. This includes connecting DMS with traffic management systems, enabling real-time alerts, and coordinated responses to risky driving behaviors.
Policy Support: Proactive government initiatives, such as tax incentives for vehicles equipped with DMS or subsidies for fleet operators adopting the technology, can encourage adoption. Mandating DMS for commercial vehicles, public transportation, and logistics fleets can also create a safer driving ecosystem.
Collaborations: Partnerships between automakers, startups, and technology providers are vital for creating cost-effective DMS solutions. Leveraging these collaborations can help design affordable systems that cater to the needs of both premium and budget segments of the market.
Awareness Campaigns: Educating drivers and fleet operators about the life-saving potential of DMS is essential. Campaigns showcasing real-world examples of how DMS can prevent accidents and reduce operational risks can significantly boost adoption rates.
Driver Training: Providing practical training programs for drivers ensures they not only understand how DMS works but also trust its capabilities. This is especially crucial for fleet operators, as their willingness to adopt the technology depends on the ease of use and reliability of these systems.

Conclusion

Driver Monitoring Systems are transforming road safety, and iMerit is at the forefront of this shift, enabling the development of cutting-edge DMS technologies through its comprehensive data solutions. By offering high-quality annotation and labeling services with predictive AI models for automation and active human oversight to identify edge cases and potentially hazardous situations. iMerit empowers companies to build systems that detect fatigue, distraction, and other risky behaviors in real-time. This human-in-the-loop approach ensures data accuracy and scalability, enabling AI models to function reliably in India’s complex driving environments.

iMerit’s advanced approach integrates automation, custom workflows, analytics, and insights to enhance DMS performance. Its pre-trained models enable automatic facial point detection, while custom taxonomy and flexible workflows support seamless data pipeline integration. AI-assisted quality control ensures high annotation accuracy, with human validation and random sample checks maintaining data integrity.

Beyond DMS, iMerit’s expertise in multi-modal AI solutions for autonomous vehicles provides a holistic approach to modern mobility challenges. From 3D point cloud annotation to video frame segmentation and model-fine tuning, iMerit delivers high-quality, context-rich datasets that help autonomous vehicle developers refine and advance their systems. This capability extends to enabling the seamless integration of DMS into autonomous and semi-autonomous vehicles, paving the way for safer fleets and more reliable navigation in chaotic traffic conditions.

To fully realize the potential of DMS and autonomous vehicle technologies, collaboration among stakeholders is essential. By partnering with automakers, technology providers, and government agencies, iMerit contributes to making these solutions affordable, accessible, and scalable. As India embraces smarter mobility initiatives, iMerit’s data solutions play a vital role in reducing road fatalities, enhancing fleet efficiency, and fostering a culture of responsible driving.