You must consider yourself blessed if you have not been chided by an
auto or taxi driver as `L board’, just because you were following traffic rules
and driving. It is assumed in our country that you’re a disciplined driver
because you don’t have the driving skills to be indisciplined. Even if
we Indians are given two hundred feet driving space on either side of the road we
will create traffic jams. It seems, we just don’t have the gene which is
responsible for `disciplined driving’ on the road.
I don’t understand what parents
think of themselves when they let their under-aged kids drive on the road. Is
there no better way to prove their love? Is there no sane way of making their
kids independent and bold? If their kid hits somebody, they know how to get
them out of legal troubles but what happens if their kid hits an electric pole
and gets electrocuted? What’s the point
of crying and wailing later?
Wrong-side driving in our country is a
religious ritual which transcends all religions. Motorists feel it is the
equivalent of switch hit or googly on a cricket field and execute it with
impunity. Most of these idiots feel `when
there are no vehicles coming from the other side, what is the wrong in driving
on other side of the divider? Even otherwise vehicles coming from other side should
see and adjust themselves’. On a sarcastic note one can say by breaking lane
discipline they are sticking to the national ideal of `United we stand, divided
we fall’. It’s high time that atleast on Bengaluru roads, a separate lane is
made for wrong side driving on either side of the road.
Those who drive cars are not above board.
Some of them are worse than auto drivers both in behavior and driving skills.
`Bigger the car lesser the common sense of the driver’ is a postulate on Indian
roads, few would dispute. Those who drive SUVs feel that it is an insult to
their vehicle to drive behind a small car, and overtake it, use all
intimidating techniques. Most car owners feel that they can park their cars
even in middle of the road as long as they put on the parking lights. A handful
of car drivers use indicators to show which direction their chariot is likely
to turn. When I start my drive, I put my mobile in `Airplane Mode’ because I
know that even if I get a call that my nearest or dearest is serious, I can do
nothing about it. However, this opinion is not shared by most car owners and
they are ever-ready to talk on the mobile while driving, making an ass out of
themselves and putting theirs as well as others lives into risk. Wearing a seat
belt is presumed to be necessary only while driving on a highway whereas its
need is more on city roads where the need for applying sudden brake is more.
Footpath as defined in the dictionary is “a narrow path for walkers
only or a raised space alongside a road, for pedestrians”. In Bangalore it is a
space exclusively reserved for the shopkeepers and garage owners to transact
their business. Many of the corporation authorities don’t even know it is an
offence and those who know it is one make a quick buck from the traders. The
traffic police who promptly book any vehicle for being parked in a no-parking
zone do not mind when the footpath is fully obstructed. The pedestrians are
left with no option but to walk on the road. Once in a while, one of them will
get hit by a vehicle and people will burn a few vehicles but that does not
affect either the corporation or the traffic police to crack hard on the
offenders. After all allowing such transgressions is so beneficial to both the
parties.
The fines and punishment for traffic offences
have to be increased 10x times but as long as breaking traffic rules and getting away with
it is considered a part of smartness or one’s social reach, the traffic sense
in our country is not going to improve.
This blog
is part of Nissan Safety
Driving Forumn whose COMMITMENT TO SAFETY IS BASED ON GREAT CONVICTION
ABOUT THE NEED FOR CAUTION AND SAFETY WHILE ON ROAD. THEY HOPE TO BRING THE
MUCH NEEDED CHANGE IN THE MINDSET OF THE MASSES.
