Roads of Bangalore

One of our German colleagues, who had come over on a visit once, remarked “I saw some cows on the road when I was coming to office. It is very funny. Why don't they tie them up?” I was quite surprised. Why should we tie a cow? That would be cruelty to animals at its worst. We are not tied to our computer monitors when we are at work. Why cows then? Moreover, cows have been using the streets ever since the first street was paved in India. Why take away their right all of a sudden? I was very surprised. Then he continued, “Aren't they a big disturbance to traffic?” That set me thinking. Are cows really a disturbance? Why not have a closer look at the Bangalore roads.

First, let’s take the vehicles. Every day, thousands of people undertake a journey in the BMTC bus - a journey filled with adventure, romance (especially if there are colleges enroute), emotions, humor and even music (courtesy - college students) - all the ingredients of a super hit masala movie. The people who travel can be “broadly” classified as - Passengers and College Students. The people who travel inside the bus (where one is supposed to travel) are called “Passengers”. People who travel with a major part of their body out of the bus are called “College Students”. And these are not ordinary college students - you have a Statistics student trying to calculate exactly how much of his body is inside the bus (usually it comes to around less than 10%), a Physics student trying to find the centre of gravity of his body by leaning out of the bus as far as he can, a Chemistry student testing the strength of the metal of which the footboard is made and a Medical student just trying the weirdest way to land in a hospital (by falling out of the bus -- voluntarily or involuntarily). We also have the bus drivers - they consider the traffic lights to be just decorative. Take a look at them, enjoy the view and move on - whatever be the color. Add to this the private mini-vans, the drivers of which are too young to have a driving license or too ignorant to know that they need one. Of course, the IT/ITES industry contributes with its share of company shuttles, call centre cabs and vehicle lease policies.

What about lane discipline? How do the traffic police ensure that? First, remove the lanes. Lane indiscipline happens only when there are lanes. No lanes, no indiscipline. But how do they ensure that the vehicles stick to the left side of the road and not follow the Western way of traveling on the right or even worse, using the entire width of the road. That brings us to the second step - ask the BWSSB or BESCOM or any other organization which can dig roads and request them to do it right in the middle of the road. After one organization has put something in, ask the other one to take something out and so on. This will ensure that there is always a pit in the middle of the road. Vehicles have no option but to stick to the left. But, what do they do to prevent vehicles from going too far left? Third step - ask the local paan-wallah, vegetable-wallah, this-wallah and that-wallah to open a shop on the side of the road. This will restrict the vehicles from going too far to the left. I don’t think there can be a better way to ensure lane discipline.

Then, the pedestrians. We cannot miss out on them. Every vehicle driver in Bangalore wants this species called “Pedestrians” to disappear from the roads. They chase them away from the roads or in worse cases, just hit them. But the Pedestrians also fight for their survival by perfecting the art of jay-walking driving the drivers crazy!!!

After seeing all these, can someone sincerely believe that cows are a big disturbance to traffic?

Obviously, it is human beings who are the greatest hurdle to smooth traffic. So tie them up.

Let the cows enjoy the roads.