In the line of duty

Thirty-nine-year-old Kamal, a marketing professional with an IT firm, was stuck in traffic on Malleswaram main road some time ago. He sat in his car, waiting for the congestion to ease a bit but the vehicles didn’t seem to move. Kamal handed the keys of his car to his wife Megha, stepped out of the vehicle and began directing the traffic. He actually managed to help in clearing the jam to some extent.

Although Kamal’s was a spontaneous reaction to the situation, he understood that he had it in him to do something for the society. “I was a civilian then and didn’t know that traffic wardens existed. Much later, when I visited my cousin in Hyderabad, I saw a sticker on his car that said ‘Traffic Warden’. That’s when I got to know that Bengaluru too has a unit and wasted no time in joining it,” recollects Kamal.
 
Many like Kamal don’t get paid for what they do but they still fulfill their duty by manning prominent junctions in their spare time and volunteering their service to spread awareness about road safety.

And now there are a lot of youngsters who have become traffic wardens. They believe that they can make a difference and bring about a change in people’s attitude. They come from all walks of life, but software professionals top the list. They work five days a week and dedicate a few hours on the weekends to controlling traffic. This, they concede, is no easy task but a completely fulfilling process. Kamal says, “There are some people who hurl abuses at you and drive away while some others cooperate and follow the rules with a smile.”

Asked if his family was supportive, Kamal says, “At first they found it difficult to understand why I was doing this but later they began to relate to my passion and mission.” He says his friends appreciate his efforts and jokingly call him the ‘sergeant’ of the group.

It was a newspaper clipping that Gopalkrishna, an employee with IBM, read a few years ago that changed his life. He read that in India, almost 800 people die in road accidents almost everyday. “This got me thinking about what I could do to save people’s lives. That’s when I joined as a traffic warden. Educating and creating awareness about road safety among motorists has become more important now than ever,” he says.

  Gopalkrishna adds that he not only finds the job challenging but also a completely satisfying one. “It gives me happiness to see people instantly wearing their helmets and fastening their seat belts when told to do so. It’s best to catch them young,” says Gopalkrishna. Now his daughters, Deepika and Ankitha, have started following their father’s path and talking to their friends about the importance of adhering to traffic rules.

It is the bad condition of the roads and heavy traffic that prompted Madhu, an IT professional, to get himself enrolled as a traffic warden. “There’s no point in cribbing about traffic and the poor condition of the roads when we can do something to initiate a change, however small it may be. I spend the first half of the day with my family and on Saturday evenings, I am out on the roads directing traffic,” he says. “It a stress-buster and always leaves me refreshed,” adds Madhu.

There are also a few women like Shashikala, a teacher, who has volunteered to be a traffic warden. She says that weekend is the only time she gets to spend with her family but also feels like doing her bit then towards reducing the traffic congestion in the city.

“My cousin is a traffic warden and I was inspired to join after I heard the many stories he had to narrate and the difference he has made in the jurisdiction that he controls,” says Shashikala.

She fulfills her responsibilities at home and then steps out on a Saturday evening to man traffic in and around the busy junctions of Jayanagar. “Traffic wardens get a lot of respect and admiration from people and it is gratifying when they obey the rules,” she says.