The unfortunate death of Mr. Gopinath Munde has, once again, put the spotlight on the poor track record of road safety in our country. While the nation woke up to the realization that our country is a dangerous place to travel by road, various theories were floated about how the accident took place. However, an important point has been overlooked yet again. It was mildly amusing reading about some of the statistics that I’ve been harping on about on these pages for a while now – suddenly these were grabbing prime space in virtually every news medium. As expected, there were knee-jerk reactions from politicians, ministers, and any number of other ‘experts’ about what’s wrong, and what steps need to be taken to avoid such incidents in the future. A serious problem still lurks, however, which our authorities either fail to understand, or are unwilling to tackle. Everyone seems to be ignoring the elephant in the room – the lack of driver training. The reality is that even in the most prosperous and developed states in our country, there simply isn’t any proper driver education that takes place. And, while some basic information may actually be passed on to private car drivers, the vast majority of commercial vehicle drivers get nothing other than on-the-job training after they’ve ‘procured’ a license by any and all means. Of course, in many states, getting a driving license from the local RTO is just a matter of spending a few extra bucks. As a result, there are millions of drivers on our roads today who have no knowledge of what’s right or wrong. Every day, we witness countless people breaking every rule you can think of – driving on the wrong side, jumping traffic signals, not wearing seat belts or helmets – simply because they don’t know any better. If that isn’t a recipe for disaster I don’t know what is. And if this doesn’t change, I don’t see how we can expect the situation to improve. Worse still, the traffic police look equally clueless about the rules and regulations that they’re supposed to enforce. As a result, you see overloaded, slow-moving vehicles in the fast lane with their goods protruding well beyond the vehicles’ frame – adding another element of danger to the multiple rules and regulations that are flouted everyday with impunity. Things are just getting worse by the day, as the traffic increases and the number of clueless drivers on our roads grow exponentially. But the fact remains that there are no programmes to train our drivers, or even our law enforcers. Our citizenry prefers to take shortcuts, rather than caring about safety instead. At the risk of painting a very grim picture, it seems that we’re going to be see more accidents and untimely deaths on our roads for many years to come. Our newly crowned Transport Minister seems to be siding with E-rickshaw drivers to make them legal on the streets of our capital. So, be prepared for yet more chaos… God help us. In the meantime, help yourselves by following the rules. It has to start somewhere after all!
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