Two-wheelers were considered a boon to the middle class when they got on the roads 40 years ago. Besides making one mobile, it made for easy and convenient way of travel. It is distressing that now the same useful invention has become a menace on the roads.
I have just returned from hospital after visiting our neighbour there. A senior citizen, 82 years old, he was knocked down by a two-wheeler while retrieving his suitcase from his car trunk. He has to be operated on for replacement of the hip joint and that means a minimum of three months for recovery, apart from the pain and heavy expenses.
He is the third victim from our building, who has been hit severely by two-wheelers. The other two were hit while crossing the road at a zebra crossing. It is significant that in all the cases, the two-wheeler driver fled leaving the victims on the road. I and my husband have stopped crossing the busy TTK Road, near our house in Chennai, out of sheer anxiety to protect ourselves from the two-wheelers. This may look silly, but two-wheelers can emanate from anywhere and proceed at breakneck speed towards the hapless pedestrian trying to cross a road.
They never decelerate — they go around the pedestrian at the same speed, with utter disregard for the zebra crossing or traffic around them. The pedestrian has to judge the speed of the two-wheeler coming towards him/her and then scoot across or step back.
The other day, I was a witness to an incident at one of the traffic signals. A motorcyclist, with no helmet, was busy on the mobile phone while driving, with his head pressed downwards on the phone perched on the right shoulder. When the traffic policeman attempted to stop him, he just veered away and sped off while still talking on the phone.
It was a painful sight, with the rule-breaking offender getting away so easily and the policeman unable to do anything further. The policeman could not even jot down the number of the vehicle (written in small fonts).
This simple incident highlights a number of distressing truths: (1) the total lack of respect of a citizen for the authority of the policeman; (2) the propensity of the rider for breaking laws and not feeling bad about it, (3) the absence of any tool for the policeman to catch the offender.
I think there is a fundamental reason for this abominable driving behaviour. For getting a licence for cars, people go to driving schools, where a certain amount of road discipline is taught. But in the case of two-wheelers, this job is done by a brother, sister, father, friend, etc., and the result is that the person gets to know how to ride the vehicle, but not how it should be ridden on the roads. I am sure that no two-wheeler rider would know the difference between a white line, a white dotted line and a yellow line. The two-wheeler riders definitely do not recognise zebra crossings and one-way streets.
Their motivation seems to be to reach the destination as fast as possible, never drive behind any other vehicle, always try to be at the front of the traffic, manoeuvre into all spaces in between vehicles and always overtake from the left. The practice of overtaking from the left is the main reason for a very great number of fatal two-wheeler accidents.
A two-wheeler has a lot of sharp metallic things sticking out, so it causes damage to the victim. I have my serious doubts whether the enforcement of heavy fines and suspension of licence will ever happen on Chennai roads.
The only thing I can do as a pedestrian is to take as many precautions as I can to see that I do not become the next casualty in a hospital bed.
