Hum Nahin Sudhrenge

Mail News Service

Jamshedpur, Feb 2: There were times in the not too distant past when the very mention of ‘police’ sent shivers down the spine of both sections of citizens, simpletons and criminally inclined. But with the passage of time the tendency has evaporated and all norms and laws more or less stand as printed matter to be ignored.

But like all cycles, the fear of being caught is slowly but steadily making its way back. The traffic norms are being put in place strictly now more than ever, in view of the incessant road mishaps dotting the news columns unfailingly and regularly. Many have lost their lives and yet others have been victims of jaw dropping accidents that could have been avoided with a little bit of caution. But then, for some, all caution is to be thrown to the wind and that is the main reason for the traffic cops to get into full-blooded action scaring the daylights off the segment of norm benders.

Two wheeler riders can now be seen ‘unconventionally’ wrapped in masks and helmets. With effect from Monday, February 1, the traffic police have expanded the expanse of their ‘no nonsense’ attitude by implementing the always essential and preexisting norm of pillion riders (men, women, kids and others if any) wearing helmets. People are also riding with a single life on the pillion of their two wheelers barring some foxy ones who ask the extra life or two forcibly accommodated on the pillion to get off on sight of cops at a distance and asked to walk up the extra distance till crossing the police vigil zone and then re-boarding to cover the rest of the journey. But such citizens are unaware they are carrying a load of lives at risk. But happily, such acts though there, are rare.

However, piquant cases of people riding with three or four ‘hangers on’ on their two wheelers are sights that make one dumbstruck. One on the tank or footrest in front, two on the pillion and sometimes even three seemingly going out on a family picnic or shopping spree with scant respect for safety norms and beyond the watchful eyes of the traffic police. What do you call such monsters – acrobats? Rabid? Perverse? Sadists? Whatever they are, they belong to that special breed of curs which practice the other kind of unconstitutional right: Hum Nahin Sudhrenge!