In one of my earlier blogs on Independence Day 2018, I had wished people to drive safe and follow lane driving and as a post script talked of India losing 500 lives a day in road accidents.
The government seems to have listened to it, though an year later. The new Motor Vehicle Act and the raised fines are the first step towards ensuring road safety. A lot of people have written on this subject. Let me add my two penny worth.
We have a law for everything in India, but the implementation of the law is extremely weak. As a result people bypass it or break it with impunity. Apart from that, the moment the law is enforced, there are protests by the same people who talk of government apathy. We actually want to have the best of both the worlds. We criticise the Govt, the traffic, the roads, the Gods, everyone except ourselves for the poor state but whenever someone tries to correct it, we don’t want it to be corrected. We cause strikes. What an irony!
India is a typical country where changing a social behaviour requires both an internal stimulus or incentive and an external stimulus or danda(stick). Another trait of ours is that we want the traffic to be disciplined, but we do not want to be disciplined. Come Modi or any PM, Gadkari or any minister, we will remain like this vonly.
I was surprised at the protests made in Delhi to bring down the fines. And some state governments have actually cared two hoots about the new law and reduced the fines. Damn it! the simple logic is, if you follow the rules, why will you be fined? But we want the fines to be reduced. Pray, Why? Because we want to bloody break them and get away also. We want to have the cake and eat it too. That’s our national culture, at least in North India. And mind you, I am also from that part. I have travelled extensively in India and outside. Within India itself there are examples of North Eastern states and Goa, where citizens maintain lanes, do not block all lanes for minor stoppages and are not so selfish. They give consideration to other users of the road and they also look down upon traffic rule breakers.
Now that the government has taken the first step towards raising fines for 4 wheelers, it also needs to pay attention to the violations by 3 wheelers, 2 wheelers, rickshaws, cyclists, thela wallahs and pedestrians also. This category of road user, pays a miniscule or no road tax, uses the entire walkways and roads and merrily comes from any direction, left, right, across, diagonal. Like a flash of thunder they spring from somewhere, and in order to save them or avoid them, quite a large number of accidents happen. And unfortunately in India, the bigger vehicle owner is always to blame. Between a car and a scooter, the car driver is more likely to be lynched, between a bus and a car, the bus driver is at peril. Between the motor cycle and cycle, the motor cyclist is more likely to be thrashed. Irrespective of whose fault it is.
Today the Indian roads and highways are as wide as the best internationally — the I-Ways or Autobahns or the freeways in UK, USA or Europe. But what we lack is the culture or habit of people following the discipline of lanes, of people having consideration for other users and of drivers following speed limits. These days, thanks to the new fines, a welcome change is to see people patiently waiting on traffic lights. Mr Gadkari and the media need to be applauded for it and media should further publicise the fines and force people to change their behaviour.
As a nation we need to make survival of the law breaker difficult. Not only through the law but also through social opprobrium. A combination of the two techniques may gradually have an effect for the benefit of the society.