Traffic Incident

This post will probably highlight the state of our roads, the apathy of the BMC, the quality of drivers to whom driving licenses are given, all of which leads to traffic congestion and in many cases road rage.

This morning the traffic was particularly bad on the way to office, and the car had not moved from 9.05am to 9.20am on the road approaching the traffic signal on the Andheri Kurla Road near Hotel Kohinoor International, so I decided to walk the half a kilometer or so to office. As I weaved my way through the cars and motorbikes zigzagging between cars and the pedestrians, I realized the reason for the massive traffic jam. There was a huge depression on the Andheri-Kurla road at the traffic junction with water seeping out of some damaged underground pipeline. The Versova-Ghatkopar metro is being constructed on this stretch which may have contributed to the damage.

The BMC “constructs” roads to perpetuate their right to make money through contractors for road repairs, hence shoddy work gets rewarded – and we think we are going to be a Shanghai or the new International Finance Center to replace Dubai! The traffic cops at the junction are over burdened in trying to control traffic which has burgeoned beyond imagination with more than 300 new vehicles being registered every day in the city – wish the roads could keep pace!

As I passed the stretch on to the lane leading to MIDC, I was careful enough to use the narrow footpath so that traffic flow would not be affected by my jay walking! I had crossed Elegant Business Park and was proceeding at a brisk space towards my office when ahead of me I saw that the footpath was occupied by a huge garbage bin – I had no choice but to walk on the road to circumvent the bin – the sad part was the garbage had not been cleared by the BMC conservancy staff and it had overflowed from the bin on to the road. As I moved from the footpath onto the road, a Maruti Swift decided that I must be a part of the road and thought it fit to run into me – he actually hit me from behind on my right leg, bringing me down on my knees and helping me slightly twist my left ankle in the bargain! (this with the SCMM marathon round the corner!) I was fuming by then, because another 5 seconds and I would have circumvented the garbage bin and would have been on the footpath, I asked the joker to open the passenger side door. He was arguing with me that I was on the road, I asked him did I have a choice – please look at the garbage and the bin occupying the footpath. The guy says he did not see the garbage bin – a 6 foot high 5 feet wide garbage bin was somehow invisible to the guy, like maybe I too was invisible and maybe that’s why he managed to bump into me! I looked down and saw my shoe was soiled with garbage and I got still more bugged, I saw a box of tissues in his car, and demanded some from him to clean my soiled shoes – by that time he had a pretty scared look on his face as I was giving him a lot of “English” and he had decided that silence was the better option to verbosity! This guy was probably in his late thirties – early forties, executive types with a tie and all – and he did not have the judgment to steer his car past me nor the patience to wait for five seconds till I passed the garbage bin! This raises the question - on what basis are driving licenses issued by the RTO! By the way my car reached the office at 10am - a good half an hour after me - a distance of only 500 metres!

With the cities infrastructure at a virtual breakdown stage is it any surprise that traffic incidents and far more serious traffic accidents take place? Road rage is common – as every minute counts while one has to reach the office on time for fear of late marks, loss of pay etc. Does the Government ever think of cutting the salary of ward officers and engineers who perpetuate a system where apathy, indifference and a skin thickened by graft is the norm? Some day – hopefully in my lifetime – I may get to see the city of my birth as a world class city worth living in. Hopefully…..