Don't abet a crime!

The truants of the City’s autorickshaw drivers form the basis of many dinner-table conversations and casual discussions. But anecdotes of lane-jumping, illegal overtaking and unnecessary honking apart, do Bangaloreans really make an attempt to chide erring drivers?

In reality, the opposite is often true — passengers who are
 in a rush tend to turn a blind eye to the many traffic laws that autorickshaw drivers flout, sometimes even encouraging them to jump signals and take quick shortcuts — on the wrong side of the road.

In many cases, this is because of time constraints and in others, due to sheer laziness; but Sneha, a professional, points out that the few enthusiastic passengers who actually do tick off rule-flouting drivers face no end of
opposition.

“In Bangalore, people don’t follow the rules unless there are dire consequences. Sitting inside an autorickshaw, it’s difficult for a passenger to actually complain to the driver.

It might help if a passenger was to go beyond just scolding and instead threaten some sort of action — but for that, the police need to take the responsibility of following up whenever a passenger has a complaint,” she says.

Practical difficulties aside, though, she agrees that passengers should definitely consider it a duty to prevent autorickshaw drivers from openly breaking rules.
 “It’s not enough to simply quote the rulebook — the rules have to be followed as well,” she insists.

Vidyullatha, an engineering student, is also of this opinion. However, she has no qualms in admitting that often, passengers find it more convenient to look the other way when an autorickshaw driver breaks a rule, and keep their fingers crossed that they won’t get held up by any police intervention.

 “It’s definitely a passenger’s duty to try and stop an autorickshaw driver who’s breaking the law.

But unfortunately, since many people are in a rush, they actually ask their drivers to jump signals and drive faster. This logic doesn’t hold though, because during peak hours, everybody is in a rush or has some kind of emergency,” she laments.

The other aspect of the problem that she highlights is that given the pricey behaviour of most autorickshaw drivers, passengers simply grab what they can get and pray that they reach their destination without further problems.

“Whenever anyone is trying to get a rickshaw, these drivers either refuse to go straight-out, or ask for extra money,” she explains, adding, “so when you go get an autorickshaw, you simply take it.”

Sushil Unni, a counsellor, however, sees no two ways about this issue.
“It is definitely a passenger’s duty — for two reasons. Firstly, turning a blind eye to such problems simply cause them to increase.

Secondly, it’s a safety issue. If I don’t stop a driver from travelling down the wrong side of the road, he may hit someone coming in from the opposite direction,” he says.

The reality, though, is something different.  “Most passengers simply close their eyes. They think it’s a one-off incident and not their business,” he concludes.