02 January 2014, 10:17 PM IST
To cut down on pollution and curb oil imports, put all motor vehicles on silent mode
Gurgaon, where i live, has started observing Raahgiri days on a regular basis. Pedestrians, cyclists and joggers take over selected streets which are kept free of all forms of motorised transport. This concept is catching on in towns and cities across the country.
The idea is to cut down on pollution, curb expensive oil imports which the country can ill afford and improve public health by promoting walking and cycling as the preferred modes of locomotion. But as good as the idea is, it`s not going to work.
Because, do what we will, the number of cars, two-wheelers and other motorised vehicles keeps increasing at the rapid pace with which jackrabbits are said to breed. Middle-class India is on the motorised move and there seems to be no way of stopping it. Yesterday's cycle owner is today's scooter owner, and tomorrow's small car customer. And no amount of Raahgiri days and similar schemes are going to put the brakes on the country's motorising momentum.
Except one thing — a total ban on the manufacture, sale and installation of any and all kinds of horns for motorised vehicles, be they automobiles, trucks, buses, three-wheelers or two-wheelers. If it's got an internal combustion engine which consumes any form of fuel — petrol, diesel, CNG — it can't have a horn.
A hornless India will automatically become a motorised traffic-free India. Because, as all of us Indians know, all motorised transport — cars, two-wheelers, etc, etc — are propelled not by their engines, as technological myth would have us believe, but by their horns.
Observe any Indian driving any vehicle on an Indian road. The road ahead might be totally clear of other traffic. But the driver will blow the vehicle's horn at full blast: PEEH-PAAH! PEEH-PAAH! Why? Because the driver knows that if the horn is not blown, at maximum volume, the vehicle will come to a complete standstill.
When the vehicle, horn blasting away, comes to a red light, the driver will attempt to blow the vehicle's horn even louder. Because, as Indian drivers know, Indian traffic lights are especially designed to change from red to green when they hear the noise of horns being blown as loudly as possible.
The same applies to Indian traffic jams. The only way to make gridlocked traffic move is for everyone involved to press down on the horns of their respective vehicles and keep them pressed — PEEH-PAAH! PAAH-PEEH! — till the jam dematerialises thanks to the magical power of the horn.
Indian drivers can, and often do, drive without benefit of indicator lights, brakes, or even steering wheels or handlebars. But no Indian driver can drive any vehicle without the essential component which is the horn, the shriller and more eardrum-piercing the better, like a contestant in a shrieking competition for banshees.
De-horn motor vehicles, and you will immediately de-motorise India. A deathly hush will fall over the country. The sudden silence will be deafening. KABOOM! What was that? A terrorist bomb blast? The economy crashing to a new low? Nah. Someone just dropped a pin...
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