It was 10:15 PM on a monday night and I decided to take an auto
after waiting 20 mins for any sign of a BMTC bus!! Auto driver informed
me as I stepped into it..”one and half aguthe saar” implying it will
cost me one and half, to which I agreed helplessly!! We stopped at the
DG bunk signal when another auto zipped past us. Auto driver, who was
quiet until then, started explaining to me the perils of jumping a
signal. According to him, it not only puts the people in danger, there
is the additional threat to the driver’s license!! I was amazed at his
knowledge of the latest developments in the traffic division. He
informed me that cameras have been newly installed in 150 traffic
signals(DG bunk being one of them) in bangalore, with the plan
toincrease them to 600 by the end of this year!! However, he was more
concerned with the fact that three traffic violations in a single month
could lead to the cancellation of the Driver’s License!!He even pointed
me to the new seat belt rule, which could also lead to the DL
cancellation !! According to him, R. Ashok – Minister for Home and
Transport, was the culprit behind these laws which sounded ridiculous to
him. Collection of fines was acceptable but he signal jumping was a
“necessity” under emergencies(or any justifiable situations) for which
DL cancellation sounded disastrous and unjust.
He rambled on for few more minutes on the same topic and I wasn’t sure if he was supporting the new rules or turning against them as he added points equally for both!! Once he had cooled down, I was able to get some details about his personal life. Nagaraju is an auto driver aged 35 who lives with his Wife and 2 kids aged 14 and 12 (yes, he married early
). He answered, rather proudly, that his was a love marriage when I
inquired about the reasons for getting married so early. He was born and
brought up in bangalore and he drifted on to the topic of the increased
cost of living in the city. “shanthi sagar alli naaku vare rupai ondu
masala dose thindre hotte thumbogthithu, eega adhe dose 24 rupai.. aadru
10 thindru hotte thumballa” which translates to “few years ago, a
single masala dosa in shanti sagar was sufficient to fill ur stomach and
costed only 4 and half rupees, but now the same dosa costs 24 rupees
and yet you cannot be sure if it can fill ur tummy!!” he complains about
the exponential increase in the prices and the degraded quality of
products. And he launched a war against the increasing fuel prices and
how it affected his life to a larger extent as his daily bread depended
on it!! He took a dig at the politicians as well and the current state
of karnataka politics which is in shambles saying .. “ee baddi makkalu
avr mane katkoLakke nam kaasu odithare sir, naave namge dhudko beku,
naanu ivrge vote hakodu niLsbittidini eega eradu varshadinda!!” “these
Idiots(or something more abusive) use our money to build their homes,
there is no use trusting them, we should only earn money by working
hard, I have even stopped voting for these guys from the past 2 years!!”
to which I responded with a lengthy speech on the importance of a
single vote and how he is not utilizing the power he has to choose the
right leader. I had very less time in which to convince him to vote
again as we were nearing my home. He then confessed with me that he had
wasted most of that day in searchof his friend(who owed him money) which
ended unsuccessfully and he had not earned enough for that day. He was
feeling a little guilty but it was clear to me that he was scared of his
wife(who isn’t??) and her reaction. I reached home, paid him and bid
him good night!! I started a little research on few facts that he
mentioned and most of them turned out to be true… there indeed has been a
steep rise in the fuel prices in the past few years among other things
making it even harder for many people like Nagaraju to survive!!
He rambled on for few more minutes on the same topic and I wasn’t sure if he was supporting the new rules or turning against them as he added points equally for both!! Once he had cooled down, I was able to get some details about his personal life. Nagaraju is an auto driver aged 35 who lives with his Wife and 2 kids aged 14 and 12 (yes, he married early
). He answered, rather proudly, that his was a love marriage when I
inquired about the reasons for getting married so early. He was born and
brought up in bangalore and he drifted on to the topic of the increased
cost of living in the city. “shanthi sagar alli naaku vare rupai ondu
masala dose thindre hotte thumbogthithu, eega adhe dose 24 rupai.. aadru
10 thindru hotte thumballa” which translates to “few years ago, a
single masala dosa in shanti sagar was sufficient to fill ur stomach and
costed only 4 and half rupees, but now the same dosa costs 24 rupees
and yet you cannot be sure if it can fill ur tummy!!” he complains about
the exponential increase in the prices and the degraded quality of
products. And he launched a war against the increasing fuel prices and
how it affected his life to a larger extent as his daily bread depended
on it!! He took a dig at the politicians as well and the current state
of karnataka politics which is in shambles saying .. “ee baddi makkalu
avr mane katkoLakke nam kaasu odithare sir, naave namge dhudko beku,
naanu ivrge vote hakodu niLsbittidini eega eradu varshadinda!!” “these
Idiots(or something more abusive) use our money to build their homes,
there is no use trusting them, we should only earn money by working
hard, I have even stopped voting for these guys from the past 2 years!!”
to which I responded with a lengthy speech on the importance of a
single vote and how he is not utilizing the power he has to choose the
right leader. I had very less time in which to convince him to vote
again as we were nearing my home. He then confessed with me that he had
wasted most of that day in searchof his friend(who owed him money) which
ended unsuccessfully and he had not earned enough for that day. He was
feeling a little guilty but it was clear to me that he was scared of his
wife(who isn’t??) and her reaction. I reached home, paid him and bid
him good night!! I started a little research on few facts that he
mentioned and most of them turned out to be true… there indeed has been a
steep rise in the fuel prices in the past few years among other things
making it even harder for many people like Nagaraju to survive!!
Nice one dude…it’s indeed getting ridiculous with the fuel prices…but the problem is, people are too lazy to use public transport!!!
ReplyDeleteMake sense and nonsense with Raju’s words… Traffic rules!
ReplyDeleteAny rule should be a guideline yet not the deadline. When people follow them at most of the times through out the city, city traffic will be in ordered fashion, some cases of breaking rules say .01 %(just to say very small) should not be harm to the traffic and hope fully not harm people. In that cases, traffic police may be at comfortable position to evaluate the minor offence and let go in case of emergencies.
Whereas we, people, in our country never accustom to rules most of the times creating chaos on road! Hence stringent rules with heavy fines comes handy to bring things into better situation. In case of helmet rule since decades, earlier there were comments that different Govt make wearing helmet mandatory when they get forced and bribed by manf of helmets again which is subjected to discussion while the very advantage of wearing is to protect ourselves.(We know how our friend got saved by wearing helmet recently due to tree branch cut). But consider the classic example of seat belt. This is not that Govt can make money as these are by default fitment in all present day cars again to protect the driver and passengers. Until Govt. brought the stringent measures they were rarely used.
Of course we do have Green, Orange, Red dots on our DLs which has to be punched every time we violate traffic rules and after 3 chances DL gets cancelled.
By the way fuel price rise is one such topic where i think we are not qualified to comment and cant do much apart from start using public transport and car pool if we want to really save the buck for now!
Most important thing is unless we change for better, we cant change the system for better!
Nice article .. Inflation is too much how can a common man survive in this conditions..Its not just use of public transport , they can use smaller vehicles instead of big cars, i have seen many instance where even though just a single person is traveling they will use big cars, instead they can use a motorbike to travel this reduces fuel consumption and also saves the planet..
ReplyDelete