Namma Bengaluru!

If the word "traffic" were an adjective in the English language, its superlative would have been called "Bangalore". I have seen really bad traffic jams in many places, but have always known this to be a sporadic thing. Beautiful Bangalore boasts of this on a diurnal basis.

Every stretch of road is pregnant with smoking vehicles. The planning authorities are hell bent on having buses stop immediately after traffic signals for a never-ending queue of people to board and unboard, thus choking the flow at a green light.

The longest trailers / trucks with absolutely no or capacity load on them can ply on Ring Road during the peak hours at high speeds ranging between 5 and 10 kmph. To top it all, maamaas (traffic cops, as known in Tam land) stop these trucks for money-milking right amidst peak traffic.

Pedestrians cross at will at the K R Puram station junction, with no regard for a bus speeding toward them. At their very sight, the bus driver must stop. And we all know that in the event of an accident, the kind-hearted mass favours the lady involved or the one with the smaller vehicle or the one that sustains more injury. So, traffic stops when pedestrians cross / jaywalk. Great enforcement of respect for pedestrians.

And we shouldn't blame the infinite metro / flyover construction projects going on. On 100m of available road, 110m of digging is done and the remaining place is available for people to drive about. Development at its best.

No garbage bins are available on roads. The "corporation" sends tractors that tow big bins with holes every morning to collect trash from homes. And they need some goodwill money every week to be paid. Or else, they wouldn't pick your trash. Above all, the goodwill money ensures that an undefined, but constant quantity of trash gets picked everytime. If you discarded even an extra diaper, you would need to pay more to get it cleared. My guess is that these guys don't permit the installation of garbage bins on roads for fear of losing the weekly side income.

And Bangalore yearns for a Metro status... I knew this as a beautiful place as a child. I still love its charm and hate to see it this way. Brainless mismanagement is screwing it. I hope there is some way out.