The modern thinking Indian

Be careful what you wish for ! Delhi and North India were bereft of rain during the first month of the rainy season. A bit about why Delhi is special. This is a city that is supposed to become a world class city, a city that will host the Commonwealth Games. It is the city that is the capital of a hot emerging economy, the city where people from over the world get their first glimpse of Delhi.
On 27/7/2009, the first major rainfall (major means this was 4 hours of rainfall, not 12 hours or something like that) brought this city to its knees. The news channels are full of roads being flooded, all the major intersections suffering heavy jams (including many areas of the New Delhi area that normally do not suffer traffic jams). Gridlock was the word, with many cases where people did not move beyond 100 meters in 2 hours.
What are the major causes of such a situation:
1. The Delhi drains need to be de-silted and the storm water system needs to be active. However, every year, the MCD makes tall promises and falls flat on its face. Same this year, roads were flooded in the first major rain; and huge amounts of money were supposedly spent on this desilting work.
2. No traffic management. When rains start, either the power to traffic lights go off, or they cannot handle the rain; further, traffic policemen are no longer to be seen. With Delhi traffic already known to be aggressive (stupid is another word), me-first causes huge jams at any place where more than 2 roads are commented
3. When such jams happen, there is no quick action to make things better. This is when the worst of governance can be seen. It was only after news channels started doing heavy criticism of the municipal and police response that they started swinging into action
4. Places such as low lying roads or under-passes where water causes flooding are supposedly provided by pumps, but when you need them, they do not take action
There were people interviewed on TV, and a lot of them commented on how there was no action by the Government, and where were the leaders ? Well, the leaders are waiting for the day to be over, and the public to forget that something like this happened.

Labels: Delhi, Governance, Municipal Corporation, Rain, Responsibility, Traffic, Transport

Drinking and driving is a universal problem, with different countries having different ways of checking / controlling this habit. A sizable percentage of accidents are known to happen after drinking and driving, and countries have different levels of enforcement about this habit. So, for example, if you take the case of countries such as Singapore or the US, drinking and driving is not cool. You can get into severe problems if detected. It is not unknown to have to spend a night in the slammer and have points deducted from the driving license if caught drinking and driving.
The same rules apply in India, and in the recent past, the Mumbai Police has been enforcing some of these rules to a stronger degree; they have actually got magistrates to jail some of the offenders and got licenses suspended for a period of time. However, this is just Mumbai. Other parts of the country have very little policing of drunk driving (or other road related laws), and there does not seem to be much effort ongoing in that direction either. In a lot of cases, people go outside to bars or restaurants to drink, and then drive home from there even if they have had too much to drink. There is very little custom of arranging for a non-drinking person to drive one home, or to take a taxi to go home.
Now, a High Court has jumped into the gap and made suggestions regarding setting up of safe drinking and driving options (link to article):

The Delhi High Court wants strict checking of drunk customers heading home, just outside the bar/pubs in the capital, in order to prevent instances of drunken driving, leading to mishaps. After going through a report by excise department and traffic police that said almost 90% of customers frequenting bars drive home themselves, Justice J R Midha on Monday asked the Delhi Police to get cracking on drunk drivers.
"When your own report gives such a figure, it is the duty of police to enforce checks and it is in larger public interest to introduce a condition in pubs/bars serving alcohol shall have replacement drivers and shall serve liquor to a customer (self driven) only after the guest pays to book a replacement driver,'' it observed, asking the police to get cracking. On its part the police protested, arguing that both the concepts replacement drivers and checking at pubs could not be implemented instantly as these are policy decisions. Appearing for the police, counsel Mukta Gupta said, "Unless backed by a judicial order, cops can't be posted at each and every pub or bar. We are prosecuting drunk drivers and the accident rate has therefore come down."

Drunk driving cannot be cured only through enforcement (although enforcement would play a big part); the way to move ahead is to accept that people will go out and drink. A campaign that encourages the safety measures along with providing alternatives such as taxis and safe drivers would go a long way in ensuring that the deaths and injuries due to drunk driving reduce.

Labels: Court, Drinking, Driving, Drunk, Education, Law, Penalty, Punishment, Traffic, Transport

The subject of this post can be captured using the word 'Critical'. Are the highways projects being undertaken by the National Highway Authority of India critical for the development of the country ? And does the current pace of development so bad that it can be termed critical. The answer is yes to both questions, and outlines the problems that this country faces in terms of infrastructure.
The development of good, fast highways is an extremely important part of the infrastructure of the country; it helps in keeping the movement of goods across large distances, enables greater mobility of people, reduces the dangers of perishable items expiring, reduces cost fluctuations caused by distance factors, improves the life of vehicles and tyres, reduces fuel consumption, and a few others. In India, one of the best things that the BJP Government is remembered is for the massive road projects that it launched, and with the Highways Minister Col. Khanduri running it, the projects were on track. Given the importance of this area, one would have thought that the Congress Government would ensure that the projects are on track. However, for some time now, it has been clear that these projects are not on track, and here is a severe admonishment of the Government from the Delhi High Court:

The Delhi High Court seems to have hit upon the root cause of why crucial highway projects across the country have been moving at a snail's pace in the past few years. And the discovery has left the court both shocked and angry. The HC found that the ministry of surface transport and highways was indulging in "day to day interference" into the affairs of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), a statutory body granted functional autonomy by Parliament.
"The actions of the Union of India...indicates that not only autonomy granted to NHAI by Parliament through a statute enacted in this regard has been curtailed and eroded, but NHAI is sought to be reduced to a mere department of the ministry of road transport and highways," an anguished HC noted. The court discovered through evidence tabled before it how the ministry kept forwarding bidders to NHAI, asking the latter to re-evaluate their applications even though NHAI had finalized its bidding process for the Hyderabad project.

Unfortunately, this is not the only case where the Congress Government interferes with institutions. The strictures on the Health Minister over its interference in AIIMS, the severe crippling of the autonomy of the CBI, and numerous other cases are already there; in many of these cases, there has been adverse opinions from various courts that the Government shrugs off.

Labels: Congress, Court, Development, Governance, India, Responsibility, Transport

India has a variety of problems relating to traffic management, such as overall bad conditions of road, not enough road capacity in cities, a variety of slow-moving and fast moving vehicles on the roads, and so on. One of the worst, observable by almost every person on the road, is the lack of following of traffic rules and laws. People feel that traffic rules are guides that can be followed or not depending on one's wishes, and this attitude is reinforced by a very lax enforcement of traffic laws by policemen who catch drivers violating all rules.
People almost never stop before the zebra crossing, jump red lights with gusto, do not think twice about going the wrong side of the road if they can save a few minutes, speed limits are a formality, but by far the worst such transgressions are those where a person drinks and drives.
Drinking and driving is seen as one of worst offense that a person can commit on the road, since drinking (above the legal alcohol level) means that a person is no longer in full control of their senses, and as a result, is driving a powerful and heavy machine that can easily maim or kill. In countries where drinking and driving is penalized, a person caught easily loses their license to drive for some time, may have to spend a night in jail, and is on probation for some time after that. In India, incidents such as Salman Khan driving over people, Sanjeev Nanda driving over people when drunk happen; and these are the celebrity ones, there are many more that happen on a normal basis.
So far, the law was only on the books, but for the past some months, the Mumbai police seems to have taken this far more seriously. They have been catching drunk drivers, sending them to cool off a day in jail (recently they jailed the very first lady who has been caught like this for a day). Sample this incident which shows the crackdown, as well as the general attitude of people:

Keyur Parikh must have never imagined that the traffic police were actually tracking his movements, after a court suspended his driving licence in July for a period of six months for drunk driving. On Monday, the police caught 28-year-old Parikh outside Heera Panna mall, a stone's throw away from his upmarket Tardeo residence, for driving without a valid licence. Parikh then started dropping names and threatened to summon his lawyer, hoping to get off scot-free. But the cops ignored his arguments and hauled him to the Girgaum court. It turned out that he had been booked for four other parking offences as well in the past.
"Nearly 9,000 motor driving licences have been suspended by the court since June last year. We had a hunch that some of these motorists might still be driving despite their licences being suspended. A list of 10-15 such drivers was prepared and we tracked their movements from their residence to their place of work. Our officers were armed with their vehicle registration numbers and photographs. Parikh walked into our trap on Monday,'' said deputy commissioner (traffic) Harish Baijal.

This is another part of the whole problem. How many people have not heard of cases where people receive traffic citations by normal post, and tear it up without paying, since they are confident that the traffic system of generating these citations are not computerized, and that there is no major problem if they don't follow up. I recently heard that the Delhi police head was talking about such a system; and the fact that so many years after computerization, availability of hand-held system, police still cannot check real-time whether a car in front of them (and its driver) have other citations against them.
However, one should be happy when things start working. In this case, I have been hearing of this drive for many months now, so this is not a campaign that starts, runs for some time, and then stops. It is only when people believe that they are in danger of getting caught, and they cannot escape either by paying a bribe or dropping some high names that there is some progress. Of course, educating drivers is also necessary, but without some enforcement, it mostly does not work.

Labels: Driving, Drunk, Law, Police, Punishment, Traffic, Transport

Driving during the night is prone to accidents. After all, this is a time when the human body expects to get its rest (even if you sleep during the day), there is less light(in fact, a lot less); the factors that cause accidents are far more. For some time now, authorities in Tamil Nadu have been finding that the rate of accidents during the night has been increasing, and a number of factors have caused this - the most important being the sheer lack of attention of drivers caused by sleepiness. So, one way to get around this is by providing them some facilities at this time:

Bleary-eyed truck drivers on their way to Chennai wake up to piping hot coffee and crunchy biscuits these days. Worried by the high number of road accidents on the highways leading to the city, the collector of the adjoining district of Kancheepuram has initiated a welfare programme aimed at heavy vehicle drivers.
Transport officials have been instructed to serve drivers undertaking perilous night drives with biscuits and coffee, besides handing out lessons on safe driving. Truck drivers cruising down NH 4 (Bangalore-Chennai Highway) at daybreak are therefore being stopped at various points and asked to step out, stretch their legs and help themselves to refreshments. "Between 4 am and 5 am, the time when accidents usually happen, we stop the trucks and ask the drivers to wash their faces. We then give them water to drink, biscuits to munch and coffee or tea as they prefer,

This is a very welcome step, and shows a level of responsibility among the officialdom that is not seen often. One can only hope that other places adopt this method, and that it does not slow down as time passes.

Labels: Bureaucracy, Policy, Responsibility, Security, Traffic, Transport

I really wonder sometimes about whether we should blame the ordinary citizen or the police when you see laws and rules being broken so easily in the country. I was witness to something that left me wondering about this question. We see traffic rules normally broken very casually on the roads (speed limit, usage of helmets and seat belts, drunk driving, red lights, etc); most rules are broken very easily. The sad part is that most of us are guilty at some point about breaking these rules and later blaming the police for being inactive and not enforcing the rules.
I had gone to an car accessories shop for some seat covers, and witnessed a number of vehicles parked there (hogging a lot of space in the market, but that is a different story), and employees of the shop busy fixing dark film on the windows of the cars. Now, once many years back, when the police had ruled that the dark films are not allowed on car windows, I had been ordered by my parents to be the one to remove the dark film It was a painful process, and I had always hesitated after that to fix dark films because of this reason.
Now, dark films look cool; they also aid in ensuring that the car does not get so heated up in summer. Unfortunately, the dark films also end up hiding the interior of cars; preventing a clear visibility of the inside. In some of the cases where a rape has been conducted inside a moving car in Delhi, the car has typically had dark film installed. It also prevents Delhi police from being efficient in inspecting vehicles fast when they have information about criminals and terrorists. Hence, the police have decided that dark films will only be allowed up to a certain percentage of opacity.
The cars on which I could see the dark films were being installed were seemingly way beyond the level allowed by the Delhi police. When I asked one of the owners of the shop about this, he showed me a car on which the allowed level was being installed (it was in a minority). On further enquiry, he told me that most people request films more than what was allowed, and if he won't do it, others will. So, he runs a business and installs what they want.
The query that I had was now: Who is the person who is breaking the rule ? Is it the car owner who will install whatever version of the dark film that he wants ; Is it the shop owner who agrees to install the non-compliant version of the dark films ; o is the police whose rules (and enforcement of the rules) has become so ineffective that people no longer care for those rules ?

Labels: Citizen, Governance, Law, Responsibility, Traffic, Transport

The Delhi Metro is seen as an instrument for change in Delhi. The sheer presence of the Metro on many routes has led to a reduction in the bus traffic on these routes (for example, from the Dwarka to Connaught Place route), and has led to the commercial revival of many areas (the number of visitors to places such as Connaught Place, Chawi Bazaar, Chandni Chowk, etc) have all gone up and led to these places getting a new lease of life. However, the Metro project has not been without its slate of issues, one of them being the route passing through areas where there is liable to be controversy.
One major point in the past has been the changing of the skyline of the city wherever the metro passes, because suddenly you have a large seemingly unlimited concrete bridge being part of the skyline, and it can be quite ugly. However, over a period of time, we have tended to accept this as a compromise that has been made to get a system that provides more convenience. One such issue in the past was whether the Metro could be a cultural nuisance, especially when it was passing close to the Qutab complex. Eventually, the pressure by cultural experts forced the Metro line to give in, and they changed the lone so that it did not pass so close to the Qutab anymore. However, the other issue about passing close to the homes of people remains. A metro line can be noisy when a train arrives, and the height of the rail line (especially in crowded areas) can be uncomfortably close to either the second floor / windows of houses, and people feel concerned about their privacy.
There is a solution, but it is much more expensive. Building underground is as much as 3 times more expensive that over land, and wherever the metro has found a central verge, it has built overground because of the expense issue. In the case of South Delhi, the Metro plan faced some dogged opposition, but finally this challenge seems to have been overcome, and the Metro has won the issue:

The Delhi High Court dismissed a petition seeking to scrap Metro's elevated corridor project in south Delhi on the ground that it would cause noise pollution in residential areas on Friday. A Bench headed by Justice T S Thakur, however, directed the Centre and Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) to make all possible efforts to reduce the level of noise pollution which will be caused by the Metro rail running on the elevated corridor.
The petition, filed by residents of south Delhi colonies falling on the route of the project, had contended that running Metro rail on elevated corridor would create noise pollution and would interfere in their private life as it would be passing very close to their homes. The Centre had defended the elevated project, saying a huge investment would be required for building an underground Metro corridor. DMRC had also contended that contract for the project had already been awarded to the companies and it would not been possible to revert back.

So the issue has been decided for now, but the question remains of expenditure vs. convenience. For future expansion of the Metro line, such questions will again come up, so I wanted to know from readers as to what they thought of this issue.

Labels: Community, Court, Neighbourhood, Transport

Today, the 29th of May, 2008, was a day that a lot of people would have had a lot of worries about. Delhi and the whole NCR region has seen the effect of the Gujjar agitation when it last took place in 2007, and at that time, the lathi wielding and stone throwing members of the mob forced the major intersections of South and East Delhi to come to a standstill - traffic at major points such as the Noida Link road, Badarpur, Loni, etc was totally jammed, and demonstrators did pretty much what they liked. At that time, what was depicted in the media was that the police were essentially not taking any action and letting them burn buses and other public property.
Keeping this in mind, there was a lot of worry and concern about what the day would turn out like. The whole of Delhi and NCR region sees a lot of cross traffic with people moving on a daily basis from Delhi and other regions such as Faridabad / Gurgaon going to offices in Noida on a regular basis, and similar movement. For such people, the news of this Gujjar called bandh was a time for decision. Would you want to try this movement on this particular day and risk getting caught in violence, or stuck in a non-moving traffic jam for long periods of time. As a result, there were a large number of companies that actually declared a holiday today. Even where I worked, most people from places that were more than 10 Km away did not come, in many cases because their family persuaded them not to go.
The Government knows that this kind of demonstration will happen, and the long jams, violence and other such situations that afflict the regular commuters (as well as people who earn their living on a daily basis) are a reflection of the failure of Governance. Sample these reports from an article on Delhi shutting down:

Gujjars on Thursday had blocked road and rail traffic in the Capital and adjoining areas as part of their 'NCR rasta roko' agitation even as over 35,000 policemen fanned out across the National Capital Region to prevent any untoward incident. Earlier, all main highways leading to the Capital were blocked. There were also reports of stone pelting and effigies burning. At places the agitators broke windshields of cars and buses.
Protesters turned away vehicles from Noida and Gurgaon, home to scores of outsourcing and computer software firms. Many offices were also closed. Security personnel were deployed in strength in Gujjar strongholds like Mehrauli, Ghazipur, Patparganj, Badarpur, Khanpur, Ayanagar, Chilla village and Rampur, anticipating a strong showing by the community during the agitation.

But as reports by the media during the course of the day indicate, traffic was blocked for many hours and opened only around noon. During this time, people had to take side roads, or wait in long jams. And there is no point talking about the many hours lost, or the roadside vendors or people who are dependent on getting to their places of work for their daily earnings (who would travel by public transport, something that was directly attacked). This is something that the Government is directly responsible for, but one believes that the Government was just ensuring that the violence and disturbance does not cross a particular level. The other reaction by the Government was to cancel a number of trains running near Jaipur, Agra, and to the NCR region.

Labels: Caste, Community, Congress, Governance, Law, Police, Politics, Protest, Security, Transport

When we are driving on the roads of our wonderfully congested cities, there are so many things you see that make one angry. You are driving on a crowded road, inching along, and see two-wheelers and three-wheelers darting among traffic with nary a care in the world; you give them some criticism, strive to control your road rage and brake or swerve to avoid hitting them, and so on. All of us must have seen such things happen often enough that they are not worth writing about. More scary is the concept of a big bus screeching right next to you, or chasing another bus and you are driving in the vicinity, and it is worth it to waste a couple of minutes and let these buses go on the way.
But these pale in comparison to what I saw one day. I was flabber-gasted to say the least, and the road was crowded enough that I could not do anything about it. And what did I see ? It was a buy driving a small car, wearing a seat belt, and driving perfectly normally. And what was scary ? Well, this guy had no other co-passenger except for one - his infant. Now, one really does not expect people in this great country to have too much concern about a car seat or other such requirement for a baby, but in this case, the baby was sitting on this guy's lap, right between the steering wheel and the guy.
I took a double-take, I have not read all the various safety articles that are available regarding how to carry one's child safely in a car, but I was pretty sure that having your baby between you and steering wheel is not one of them. In an impact, and in the case of a baby, even a slow impact, has the effect of pushing the driver towards the steering column (and that is what the seat belt and air bag try to prevent) and most of the injuries in such cases is due to the steering column hitting the chest and the ribs. And this idiot was carrying around his baby on the most dangerous possible location in the car.
I was unsure what to do ? Traffic was such that it was impossible to reach this driver, but even if I could have stopped him, what could have I done ? What would you do ? Given that he had no idea of the danger or did not care, would he care to even listen with a bit of patience about the danger if I tried any education ?

Labels: Family, Law, Morality, Responsibility, Traffic, Transport

We have seen in the past as to how the various state and national authorities in the past have always under-performed in terms of transport planning. So, we have the scene where the roads between big cities and their suburbs are extremely congested at most times, where any big plans to improve roads such as the Golden Quadrilateral project are seen as major improvement projects (instead of a normal expectation of having good raods), where the amount of money and time lost in inter-state commerce / transport of goods is a major economic drag (the cost in terms of fuel, tyres and general wear and tear on vehicles itself is a major cost), and where large sections of the rural population are cut off because of bad roads and poor connections.
So, it is very surprising when one sees news of such projects such as the plan to have a mono-rail connection between Mumbai and its suburbs; it is difficult to credit our planners with such foresight. However, if this is genuine and a part to have an integrated transport plan for the region, then it would be great:

The monorail, a light mass transit medium earlier considered for short routes within the city, including between the two airports, is now being proposed for an integrated transport system to link satellite townships around the city. The monorail proposal was discussed when commissioners and mayors of Navi Mumbai, Bhiwandi, Kalyan-Dombivli, Ulhasnagar, Mira-Bhayander and Thane held a meeting with Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority commissioner Ratnakar Gaikwad on Saturday.
The monorail is now being seen as a supplement to the road and rail transport facilities that already exist in suburban areas on the outer limits of the city region. Gaikwad said that in addition to transport, detailed plans would be drawn up for a proper sewerage system and public toilets in the emerging cities. "All of this will be taken up under the Nirmal MMR Abhiyan," he said. No costs have been mentioned as the projects are still at the discussion level.

The other major problem that we normally see in such critical projects is the delays that happen due to lack of political will to make sure that all the hindrances that are coming in the way of such projects such as land acquisition, governmental clearances, people resettlement, etc. We have already seen this in major projects such as the National Highways scheme, the Delhi-Gurgaon Expressway, etc. On the other hand, we can already see the benefits of major transport projects such as the completed stretches of the Golden Quadrilateral, the Delhi Metro, the Konkan Railways, etc. All of them show major transport ease for travelers, reduced time and money, environmental benefits, etc.

Labels: Development, Governance, India, Reform, Responsibility, Traffic, Transport

This is a mess that is entirely of its own making. Everybody knows that the transport situation in Delhi has been a problem, and given the way that the Capital's population is growing, things are only going to get worse unless some radical steps are taken. And the answer from Delhi's popular Chief Minister, Shiela Dixit over the years? The Government has systematically crippled the Delhi Transport Corporation, letting its bus service deteriorate and basically formulating policies that have let private operators take the lead in running buses on the street.
It is only for the past 1-2 months that this entire mess of Blueline buses has taken hold, but even before that, they and their predecessor, the Redline buses, were known as killer buses. The Government is supposed to be a regulator, and if you take a simple instance of speed governors on these private buses, a special drive had to be launched to make sure that these buses had speed governors installed. Is it not that these buses need to be periodically inspected for safety and for compliance with rules, or is it that the Government looks the other way while the inspectors make money from the bus owners in return for giving them a pass certificate.
Read more »

Labels: Congress, Corruption, Development, Governance, Police, Reform, Road, Traffic, Transport

The Delhi-Hardwar highway is a fairly narrow highway in most sections, and with religious traffic, it can get very crowded nowadays. As part of National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) plans, there is a contract out to improve the highway; when I say improve, it essentially means widening the highway. This is a very good thing as it will decrease the time taken for travel, will reduce traffic congestion and avoid the jams that seem to pop up on the highway frequently. In addition, with the industrialization of the belt around Haridwar, it will help industry tremendously by reducing the time taken for transit of inputs and finished items.
So I was traveling along the highway, it was fairly congested, and was just thinking of the time that would be reduced in transit the next time. Seemed like a fairly win-win situation, and it may even be good for the environment, since the travel would be more effective, less fuel wastage, less need to replace tyres, and so on. And then I saw the casualty of the entire exercise, at least for the short term. The environment.
This was the first time that I had seen the clearance of the sides of a road passing through the countryside. For those who are unable to picturise it, think of a road with trees and foilage on either side, and then there are the farm lands. The land just next to the road belongs to the government in a number of places, and there are these big trees lining the road on both sides, providing shade on the road itself. In this furnace like situation that exists right now outside, the shaded portions are actually cooler. In many cases, the trees are local fruit bearing, and provide fruits during their seasons.
Anyhow, I digress. So what I saw was that the undergrowth below the trees was on fire all along the route. Maybe somebody can better explain, but my explanation was that first they clear all the undergrowth by burning it, and maybe killing the tree, and then remove the tree. This had already started happening. I was appalled to see this technique. We crib about global warming, we crib that it is the primary responsibility of the west, and then we contribute to it by this method of mass burning.
I was left wondering as to what would happen about the trees. It seemed fairly obvious that the new road would be a barren road, with not much vegetation on either side. Even if trees are planted on either side, and I am not sure, it will take ages to get back to the same condition as they were. I can only hope that when they plant trees, they plant the leafy local varieties that thrive in these regions.
Overall, I was pained to see the price of development, knowing it was inevitable, but even then..

Labels: Development, Environment, India, Road, Traffic, Transport

One of the ways to enforce traffic laws followed by a large number of countries is by making the fines for offences stiff, thus discouraging people from breaking such laws. So, as an example, if you are caught speeding in the US, you can pay a fine in the hundreds of dollars, and heaven can only help you if you are caught driving when drunk (you can face a night in the jail, a mark on your license or its suspension, and massive embarrassment). And you don't want to be in a country like Singapore if you are caught violating a traffic rule. India wants to join the club of countries where traffic offence related fines are so large that you will be scared to commit one. Read this report:

Your wallet will get much lighter if you are a reckless driver. The government hopes to put the brakes on indisciplined driving across the country by imposing stiff penalties. And for the purpose, it brought a Bill in Parliament on Tuesday that proposes to raise fines and penalties while providing a high compensation package for victims of road accidents.
This Act is now sought to be amended. Road transport minister T R Baalu has tabled the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Bill, 2007, which proposes the following: While speeding could cost you Rs 400-Rs 1,000 (with a doubling of the fine for repeat violators), drunken driving could get your licence suspended for 3 months besides imprisonment of 6 months and a fine of Rs 2,000 for the first offence.
The proposed legislation also authorises state governments to compound the fines if required. With an increase in the number of hit-and-run accidents, the government plans to hike accident compensation to Rs 1 lakh for death
and Rs 50,000 for partial disability.

Sounds all good and noble, but I am somewhat cynical about whether this will work in the Indian case. There are a number of other measures that will need to be taken if this has to become a reality.
Right now, even with the traffic fines that we have, there is not much of enforcement. Even in major cities, incidents of drunken driving, using mobile while driving, not following traffic lights, and plan reckless driving are extremely common and are not fined. And as you move away from a metro, it becomes even more unlikely that such offences will ever be prosecuted.
Secondly, Indian traffic police are an extremely corrupt lot. How many of us would not have encountered an incident where when caught by a traffic constable, the traffic constable would have offered to take a smaller amount, but without a receipt. If you put stiffer punishments, then that just increases the capability of traffic cops to make money. This will reach a point where the rich will get away, while poorer offenders will get squeezed.
Nowadays, if you are caught, then a person invokes all sort of influences to get away scot-free; I am the son of this minister, or I am the son of this big babu, or my father is this rich guy, or I am this godlike cricketer, and so on. Unless we reach a stage whereby the traffic constable can fine a person without fear and without any worries about future retribution, traffic enforcement will be lax.
I am not suggesting that we do not take such measures, but just by saying that the fines will increase, and hence will result in better traffic (wihout taking measures to control the above tendencies) is a bit naiive.

Labels: Community, Governance, India, Law, Police, Road, Traffic, Transport

This is a tale of 2 trips, not about the destination but the journey. The contrast is
between a trip on the Delhi-Jaipur highway and the Delhi-Hardwar highway. On 2 consecutive weekends, I went to a resort near Jaipur (called Shiva Oasis in Behror) and then to a relative's place in Roorkee (the last major stop on the Delhi-Hardwar road). The state of the highways could not be more of a contrast, and I was left to wondering that even though these are highways under the control of the National Highway Authority of India, are they symptomatic of the political administrations of these states. After thinking about this for some time, I realized that this connection is worth talking about on my blog.
The trip to Jaipur first went through the new under-construction Delhi-Gurgaon expressway. This is a delayed project, but now that large stretches of this expressway have been constructed, the experience is slowly coming to life for a large number of people. (One caveat: this highway is not meant for slow moving vehicles, cyclists, etc; so there is always a question of what good it means for poorer people. This expressway will have a dual goal, reducing the massive wear and tear and extra fuel costs for both commerical and personal vehicles, as well as making goods transport across states faster; making it easier for pedestrians is something that always seems to be a work in progress). Once you are past this highway, the wonder of the Delhi-Jaipur highway truly comes to life; even with a large number of vehicles traversing this route, the highway seems to be able to take such traffic easily. Even after passing through towns and cities such as Manesar, and others, the highway does not slow down significantly. And you can never compare this highway to a the scarred surface of a rough road, as the number of craters on this surface seems to be limited.
The Delhi-Hardwar circuit seems to be a much worse track. This is also an important circuit, given that this is the main route to the hill towns of Dehrarun and Mussorie from Delhi, as well as a major religious circuit. During religious festivals, the number of vehicles on this road are numerous. Some important towns exist on this highway such as Meerut (with a bypass), Modinagar, roorkee, and Muzzafarnagar (with a bypass). The distances of these two highways are not very different, but the time taken is very different. The Delhi-Jaipur highway would take less than 3 hours, while Delhi-Hardwar could easily take upto 5-6 hours, with a bone jarring ride in many stretches due to immense potholes. In addition, during the sugarcane season, there will be numerous tractor-trailers carrying overloaded loads of sugarcane, slowing down the whole traffic, and if one of these breaks down, the whole traffic soon comes to a grinding halt (in part because the road is very narrow in significant stretches).
Where do state governments come into this ? These highways are after all owned by the NHAI. The reason state governments are involved is because of the need to ensure that all other measures are taken to make these highways effective. In towns are allowed to build on both sides of the highways without control, soon the highway will be a criss-cross of local traffic; if slow moving vehicles such as these sugarcane transporters are allowed to move onto the highway, overall traffic will slow down; if towns such as Modinagar don't have an effective traffic management, it could take upto 1 hour to cross a town with not more than 10 kilometers. It is a state government that realizes the importance of good highways with fast movement of goods; this makes these good cheaper, reduces transportation costs in terms of fuel and wear and tear. One gets a strong feeling that the Rajasthan government gets this fact, while the UP government could not care less.

Labels: Development, Governance, India, Responsibility, Road, Traffic, Transport, Waste

Due to some relatives arriving for a family tragedy, I spent some time at Delhi airport, both domestic and international. Some experiences from the departure and arrival locations.
Let me start with the most positive experience. I had to pick some people up from the international terminal (Indira Gandhi International Airport). It seemed pretty smooth as silk if you are willing to pay up a bit. First park your vehicle in the car park (Rs. 120 if you want to park in the premium car parking), and then pay Rs. 60 for each entry intro the arrival lounge. Ideal, you wave to your visitors as they arrive and take them to the car parking. Only problem is that the premium car parking is pretty small. The regular parking is pretty decent as well.
Next is the departure from international. This is also fairly convenient, you drop your visitors at the gate. Trolleys are available without a problem, and as long as you don't stay too long there, the traffic police and the cranes do not disturb you. However, and this is where I have seen people behaving strangely, they actually stay there for extended farewells, even though space there is limited. I have seen a few even arguing with traffic police, something that I would not believe could happen in a lot of other countries.
Now comes the incredible domestic terminals. These are special, especially during peak times. First, on the route to the domestic terminal, you see a number of cars lined along the road, with a driver waiting for a call to pick them up. The route is not exactly very broad, and with these cars lined along the road, the traffic route into the terminal gets more choked. Makes me wonder, are these people so stingy that they cannot afford to pay the parking fee or are they so self-centered that they really do not care?
The parking in the domestic terminal is a mess. Given the number of flights, the number of vehicles using the parking has increased tremendously while space has remained same; and this is where things get frustating. Everybody in the Government was aware of the increase in flights, and yet a contract to modernise the airports took so much time; with so much politicking. As a result, discomfort to people using the airport has increased, and measures to improve things will take much more time.
Leaving people at the domestic terminal departure is still fine; but the arrival could do with a lot more improvement. Twice in succession it has happened that I am looking at the arrival billboard, and while the airline arrival is still not confirmed, the people that I came to pick came out. In addition, the arrival open area seems like a fish market, with so many people packed into a small area. They really need to increase the area available. The improvement from a few months back is that you have more stalls with things to eat and drink, something desparately needed if you are waiting in the heat.
Experiences inside the airport is another matter, with a separate story.

Labels: Airport, Development, Governance, India, Reform, Road, Traffic, Transport

It has now been a few days since the Delhi Police started its push towards punishing traffic violations. This is inspired (as so many things in India currently are) from the Court pushing for compounding fees for traffic violations, and hence the minimum fine being moved to Rs. 600. Now, if I look at such a move, it would be strictly a policy decision to be made by the Government in terms of fines and enforcement, but over the past decade or so, the Government typically only talks about doing something about fines, but nothing more. It is essentially then left to the court to step into the policy gap, and eventually decide policies.
Another thing that puzzles me is when the Traffic police were asked about this special drive, it emerged that the same number of policemen would be used as in the past. If the same number of policemen are being used for a special drive, then why cannot every day be a special day ? Why can't it happen that the incredibly massive number of traffic violations that happen everyday are reduced, and the brazen way in which people ignore rules as per their convenience are stopped?
We all know what I am talking about. People reach a stop light, and do 2 violations then and there. They cross the zebra crossing by some distance, putting pedestrians at great risk. In addition, as soon as they see that no one is crossing the traffic signal from the other side, they will zoom through. It seems so funny, I am reminded of the term 'creeping acquisition', the way that people reach the red line, and then slowly move ahead inch by inch while the light is red. In this way, they cover around 3-5 meters while the light is still red, and then they zoom away when the light changes.
There have been explicit instructions in the past few weeks about how coloured film is illegal, but at a very rough statistic (by looking at passing cars), I estimate that around 30% of cars still have films on the windows. Maybe people really feel that they are not going to get affected, or maybe being in Delhi, they feel that they can either use some sort of contact to get away or pay a bit of money and get away. The sad part is that they can actually do this and get away in reality. And using mobile phones, not wearing seat belts / helmets are rules violated pretty highly.
Many times I feel that the traffic police is really not serious. I remember once receiving a fine of Rs. 100 by post for crossing a red light (I don't remember that part, but I would say that, wouldn't I?), and then going to pay it at the police station. Once done, I was generally talking to people about this, and they were all surprised that I went ahead and paid the fine. Apparently nobody follows up, and hence people just tear the ticket that they receive via the post. This seemed so shocking to me, how can people just treat a ticket sent by a police authority in such a casual way, but apparently this is how the city of Delhi works.
What can be done? I believe that only a strict vigil can work, a time of zero tolerance. People have to learn that traffic laws are meant to be obeyed, not followed at a person's own discretion. After all, when one is travelling on the road, we are not only responsible for our own safety, but that of others on the road. At the same time, traffic policemen have to develop a perception of being incorruptible, and that seems equally difficult.

Labels: Corruption, Court, Governance, India, Law, Road, Traffic, Transport

Here I was stuck in another jam on the Delhi-Haridwar highway. And why had this jam happened ? A very simple explanation. This highway is a 2-3 lane highway with no central verge, and there is a lot of traffic on this highway. So, many times, traffic gets a bit slow. And so, what do clever people do ? Seeing that traffic on their side is slowing down, they simply move to the other side of the road (no divider) so that they can move ahead of the idiots who stayed on their side of the road. So, eventually, the road is completely filled with people
all wanting to move to Haridwar.
Of course, these clever people forgot that there are people who also want to go to Delhi, and they will need some space on the road as well. Now what happens, gridlock ! I once spent 5 hours in such gridlock, and was resigned to spend the whole night on the road, since it seemed to be that the gridlock will only get worse as more vehicles arrive. It took the effort of around 10 policemen plus around 15 local youths with sticks and raw language to get vehicles into a single file so that these vehicles could move. There was only one set of people who profited. Roadside vendors on the highway did good business and stayed open for much longer.
This may go away when the highway is widened, but I never can understand how people can do such things, and inconvenience everyone. In some parts of the highway, I have already seen dividers being built, and while building a divider on a narrow road reduces the overall speed of the highway, I can see no immediate way of getting around the jams that happen nowadays.
The same thing can be seen when one is waiting at a railway crossing. People crowd all the space in front of a crossing on both sides of the road, so that even when the rail gates open, it takes some time for the vehicles on both sides to manage to cross to the other side.
Now I have started seeing this inside the city as well. I saw this very recently in the road leading from Ghazipur to Noida. This is a narrow road, and there was some holdup at one end, so traffic was moving slowly. So these smart people started moving to the head of the line in the same way as outlined above, such
that eventually there was no way for vehicles from the other side to advance, and this seemed to be an incredible gridlock. I was at the tail end, but could this mess starting to happen, so I turned around and ran from there (spending 45 minutes in a jam did not seem exactly pleasurable).
Such incidents cause an immense amount of frustation, and I have seen road rage in people who see this happen. I see cars in front of me swerve in order to prevent such vehicles from moving to the front on the other side like this, and seen heated words. It causes even more frustation because you know that you are driving right, and yet see others muck up the whole traffic.
Why does such a thing happen ? Do these people realy not understanding of what they are doing, or do they not care ? It may be that they think in isolation and do not see themselves as really being part of the problem, instead they are just saving themselves in time. This brings me to a related point. Are such people really in such a hurry that they think themselves above all others and can do as they like ? I struggle to think of a solution; the only solution that I can think of is more driver education as well as more fines. Driver education sounds difficult, why would somebody who really does not care for even thinking right while driving even attempt to get more educated ? More fines is difficult to enforce on the highway given that I hardly ever see anybody even remotely looking like a traffic policeman on our highways.
The only possible solutions are:
1. Try and make these roads wider with more central dividers so that such driving can be curbed.
2. Be much more strict with respect to traffic violations, in effect turning cities into zero-violation zones. If people see transgressions being fined often enough, they will be more respectful of the law (which is not such a bad thing at all).
I personally don't think that #2 is going to happen, requires too much effort from the police, and that makes it very unlikely.

Labels: India, Law, Police, Road, Transport