We Punekars love to talk about the lack of discipline on the roads. However, having driven across the country, I would like to assure my fellow citizens that we are not the absolute worst drivers in the country, but definitely in the top (or bottom!) 5.

People are seen breaking signals, driving on the wrong side of the road, honking incessantly, not showing their turn indicators and so on.

What is the solution to this? How do we create a disciplined citizen? Well, having driven in many other countries where the drivers are far far more disciplined, I have come to the conclusion that it is not the people themselves who are good drivers or bad drivers, good citizens or bad citizens – but it is the System that determines their behaviour.

We all know this. But put an undisciplined Indian on the roads in Europe or America or Australia and they immediately become model drivers.

Forget these developed and far away countries – a short hop from Kanyakumari to Sri Lanka will amaze you. The people there look like us, talk like us, eat like us. But they drive a hundred times better than us! Even within India, the road discipline in the North East states of Assam and Meghalaya is out of this world – in spite of having very small roads and that too in hilly areas. This is because, in all of these countries the fines and punishments for breaking traffic rules are swift, heavy and inescapable. They can range from monetary loss to the loss of the privilege of driving itself.

While we can debate how the ability of Pune traffic police to implement fines without resorting to corruption till the cows come home, we can instead focus on augmenting their enforcement by implementing CCTV technology to make sure that swift and heavy penalties are levied directly without human intervention. Technology exists, it is a question of political will.

There is an impression (which we cannot back with empirical data) that people with bigger, more expensive cars tend to violate traffic rules more. This may or may not be true, but it is apparent that those with cars worth 20, 30, 50 lakhs or more are not deterred by fines of a few thousand rupees. Nordic countries have a solution to this: fines for traffic infringements are based on the severity of the offence and the offender’s income! For example in Switzerland a high income earning businessman was fined 1.1 million pounds or over INR 10 crores for overspeeding!! Along with this, we should have stiffer penalties for repeat offenders.

Of course this would also mean that we need to overhaul the process of training and licensing both new and old drivers – something that is currently taken for granted.

Having said this, please remember that even the most disciplined drivers can and will make mistakes. Sometimes we make mistakes due to fatigue.

Sometimes due to distraction as we are worried about something else happening at work or in our personal lives. Sometimes because of mechanical issues with the car – like we think we are in 1st gear when we are in the 3rd and the car stalls at the green signal after moving a little bit – and the people behind have to brake suddenly. Also, even in a perfect world, not every driver would be equally skilled – there will always be youngsters who have just gotten their first vehicle, or even middle aged / senior citizens who have just started riding or have switched from their 2 wheeler to a new 4 wheeler. Hence, all of us would make at least one small mistake every week.

Do note that we are often oblivious to our own mistakes while driving, because we don’t have a behind the car view of what we are doing. 1 mistake per person = 45 lakh honest, innocent and unavoidable mistakes per week at the 1400 chowks or 460 mistakes per chowk per day! Or 230 mistakes per chowk every morning and every evening! What this tells us is that mistakes – even when we are 100% disciplined WILL happen on the roads, and we need to develop defensive and compassionate driving skills.

Because we are all in the same boat!

But before we implement harsh penalties for traffic violations, we must ensure that the road design itself is improved. Missing road links, inadequate or unclear signages like on the Chandani Chowk Flyover, Non intelligent Traffic Signals, In correct design of wider roads that converge on to smaller roads, badly parked cars that are not towed away and heavily fined – are all things that cause and perpetuate traffic jams.  For example – some Traffic signals in Pune allow 4-8 seconds for pedestrians to cross the roads, which is physically impossible to do and also a violation of road design laws and guidelines.

This creates chaos at the signals when pedestrians then try to cross the road while the traffic is moving. Even the new Intelligent traffic signals created chaos in December 2023. These might be teething issues, but given our track record, I fear the errors may not be resolved for a long time. Each Speed Breaker in Pune is as unique as each Punekar.

None of the Indian Road Congress guidelines seem to have been followed.  Road design and lighting should be such that one does not need to use high beams. However, even with the best of lighting, many drivers seem to forget to turn off their high beams, effectively blinding oncoming traffic. The police need to start enforcing the low beam rule.

A complete, holistic and high tech traffic management plan needs to be implemented in Pune taking all stakeholders – traffic police, PMC and the local residents on board. The 2008 Comprehensive Mobility Plan (CMP) of Pune and 2018 CMP of PMRDA exist but only on paper! 

A holistic and comprehensive plan sounds great, but its implementation seems beyond the competence of this system. For example, the PMC and the Traffic Police seem incapable of co-ordinating on basic things like ‘who is responsible for deciding the pedestrian green signal timing at our traffic signals’. In a classic case of Indian bureaucratic style of functioning, each department kept saying that it was not their responsibility / jurisdiction. Another example is the recovery of fines via e-Challans. CCTV cameras across the city fine motorists remotely

But this has been implemented without figuring out how to actually ecover this fine from the offenders. Data for 2020-2022 shows that across the country, only 6 to 9% of the total fines levied are actually collected! This defeats the entire purpose of this system. What kind of society are we creating where citizens know that when they break the law, 9 out of 10 times they will not have to face the law!

Governments across the world are implementing the ‘No Broken Window Policy’ – where even the smallest infraction is treated seriously, where the smallest sign of civic breakdown is corrected immediately – because this creates a huge positive ripple effect on society.

But we are going the other way by telling people that rule of law is only on paper! And at the root of this is lack of coordination between the police who impose fines and the RTO and other government departments that have the contact data of the owners of the vehicles that are fined.