As I sat in the bus, cordoned off from the sounds around me by the AC, I marvelled at the traffic in this city. It was once the garden city - a retirement haven. Today it is full of cars and houses and people. And these people are rich, expecting the privileges of the rich. They buy the best car there is in the market, never mind the cost - it could be 30 lakhs, 60 lakhs or a crore even. They have the money and they will have the best. And every house has so many cars, they park on the roads along with the pariah stray dogs that roam the streets. BMW, Audi, Mercedes, Porsche, Pariah - all same. It is politically incorrect to say Pariah these days - you call those dogs mongrel or native mixed breed or some such thing. At night these dogs, whatever you choose to call them, rule the roads. During the day, the same roads are clogged with cars. No one rules the roads in the day. They just lie back majestically and allow the cars to stand, with very little movement.
As I sat in the bus, I wondered at these people. In the arrogance of their wealth, they buy these cars and behave as if they own the roads. The pay scant attention to basic courtesies of human society - they have the best car that money can buy, so they have to forge ahead. Who cares for the rules of the road that lies docilely below? Who cares for the law of the land - the lawmaker can be bought off with money, down to the last one of them. And so they drive, or rather urge their sarathis on. Take that little gap, go across the divider, mow that scooter down. Never mind that you are sitting in a mega chariot too big for that little gap. What ensues naturally is chaos. A chaos known as a friendly sounding traffic jam rather than by the name it really is - a traffic snarl. A snarl that engulfs you and lets you chug along slower than the cyclist who whizzes past on the pavement. A snarl that is the great equaliser on these rueful roads. You turn up the AC a notch higher or change the setting so it gets colder insider. You believe that the rolled up windows protect you from the smog outside. Believe away.
You move ahead slowly - a kilometre takes a good 30 minutes. It doesn’t matter that your car, your vehicle costs thirty times that of the tiny one next to you. You all move at the same pace. You wince as your driver in front ignores the great potholes and splashes merrily through them. You groan as you think of the physio’s bills as the ache in your neck, your back slowly picks up. Not so your car that ambles along. Right beside that ancient Ambassador that should have retired a good twenty years ago.
As I sit in the bus, I think that these roads are the best equalisers we have. The truest expression of democracy there is. All are same - you in your expensive Porsche and you in your Maruti 800 of 1997 vintage and me in my public bus. Maybe I actually have the edge. My bus is driven by someone who really wants to get ahead. And he doesn’t care to have anyone come in his way. So he manages to actually go faster than the general traffic around him.
I wonder - all these people with money, why don’t they use their wealth and influence to improve the roads and the traffic so that they at least enjoy these toys they buy? Is it that they don’t want the rest of the us to enjoy it? Can they be that petty in their wealth? Or is it that they are afflicted by apathy just like the rest of us? Ah democracy - how many ways do you make us equal?
December 2017
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