[Assam] Driving in New Delhi -a report from the LA Times

Fri Aug 4 07:59:44 PDT 2006

C-da,

  First educate the people of Gauhati (even those emigrating from rural areas, Bangladesh and other parts of India ) about the need for a workable traffic system and then enforce traffic rules.

  Umesh

Chan Mahanta <cmahanta at charter.net> wrote:
        Ram:

  > This dysfunctionality you talk about is actually more profound in the case of >Assam in most situations.

  *** Let us agree for a moment, for arguments' sake, that it is indeed so.

  Question therefore would be how to effect change for the better in Assam? Will it be by aping the profoundly dysfunctional model? With more of the same?

  I am sure, even you would agree, that will be a rather untenable proposition.

  So the answer would be to devise a better system. And out of the ashes of the dysfunctional desi system Assam must build a road to a better future.

  But there lies the problem.

  Assam does not have the freedom under the desi system to pursue such a path. Dilli controls the purse strings, and all significant powers of state. Even if tomorrow, by a miracle, a great reformer is dropped at Dispur by heavenly powers to lead Assam out of the darkness, NOTHING will come about, as long as the Indians  with their 'Kafkaesque bureaucracy and the dishonesty it has spawned' are in control over Assam( BTW, I never read Kafka -- and am not sure what exactly this Kafkaesque thang, that every highbrow and low-brow writer, including certain kharkhowa-intellectual-wannabes like to allude to is. But it sure sounds nasty :-)). Does not matter whether Assam is ruled by genuine, dyed-in-the 'tamwlor-pik' kharkhowas, or wrapped-in-the tricolor or saffron Indians, as long as the system they are beholden to is as broken as the article in the LA Times so convincingly portrays.And the steel-trap minded analysts and newspaper-columnists will wash their hands in disgust
 proclaiming 'jeyei lonkaloi jai, xeyei rabon hoy' or other such meaningless platitudes.

  Now if there had been a perceptible trend for MEANINGFUL and REAL reforms, anywhere in India, under the operative dysfunctional system, one might argue that there is room for hope. That someday it will arrive in Assam too, in spite of your obvious doubts about Assamese abilities, as you argue so often. Not that I don't agree. But the mistake you make is in assuming that those who have mis-governed Assam all these decades, are ALL that Assam has. That is a deeply flawed proposition. It is just that Assam's ablest and its best cannot and will not participate in governing Assam under the 'Kafkaesque' desi-system, just like India's ablest and the best cannot or would not participate in Indian governance.

  If you can point to any such credible trend for change, anywhere in India, your vehement disagreements could be considered to have a modicum of merit. Otherwise , it is at best, a lot of bravado and a willingness to live in denial :-).

  c-da

  At 8:50 AM -0500 8/4/06, Ram Sarangapani wrote:
  C'da,     >Bottom line: India is INCAPABLE of change. That is why Assam >must NOT peg its future to that of the profoundly dysfunctional >India.     Not so fast. This dysfunctionality you talk about is actually more profound in the case of Assam in most situations. That is why your argument carries no water.     This argument of putting Assam on the right track after separation from India is hollow - what is wrong with setting things aright now?  And what makes you think that the Assamese will suddenly become paragons of virtue or fare any better after this separation from India you talk about?     It will be interesting to see how the different states in India fare as far as corruption/dysfunctional goes. We can all agree that they are all corrupt/dysfunctional, but which of these are more corrupt than others.     --Ram     

   On 8/4/06, Chan Mahanta <cmahanta at charter.net> wrote:
  >Clandestine payoffs or special favors smooth the way for buying property and >acquiring government ration cards, among other things. They secure places in >good schools for your children, ensure you prompt attention at the hospital, >provide you access to bank loans, exempt you from local building codes.  

   *** Shame is not the issue Ram. How to change things is.  
   Bottom line: India is INCAPABLE of change. That is why Assam must NOT peg its future to that of the profoundly dysfunctional India. Assam can and ought to fashion its own system of modern,accountable system of governance, in a truly democratic fashion ( unlike des-demokrasy that is).  
   And we ought to support those in Assam who have been attempting to do just.  

   At 12:15 AM -0500 8/4/06, Ram Sarangapani wrote:
  This is a real shame. Of course we have all known this for many years. Unfortunately, it is not just in Delhi. In Guwahati, at one time it was next to impossible to get a driver's license through legitimate avenues - greasing palms was a pre-requisite. I am sure the situation may be much different today, but then, am not holding my breath.

   --Ram

   Corruption revs up perilous driving on New Delhi streets

   Up to 75 percent use payoffs to skip test and get their licenses anyway

   By HENRY CHU
Los Angeles Times
  NEW DELHI - It doesn't take a Harvard degree to figure out that driving here is hazardous to your health. Near-misses, reckless weaving and cars blithely going the wrong way are highlights of the daredevil derby known as New Delhi traffic.
  ADVERTISEMENT
  But a recent study by economists from Harvard and other American universities suggests that, indeed, a majority of this city's drivers get their licenses without actually knowing how to operate a car. They ply the roads because of a simple fact: government corruption.
  As many as 75 percent of motorists in New Delhi obtain their permits by hiring agents whose palm-greasing intervention saves them time, energy and the hassle of learning the difference between the brake and the accelerator, the report says.
  Those with agents bypass long waits in dingy government offices and almost never have to submit to the road test that's required of all would-be drivers. In fact, when newly licensed motorists who participated in the study were given a surprise driving exam, more than 60 percent flunked.
  "We had five questions about how to start a car, how to change gears and how they worked, which are very basic questions," said Marianne Bertrand, a professor at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business and a co-author of the report. "They couldn't answer them."
  Evidence of such cluelessness is thick on the ground in India's capital, where getting from point A to point B is a white-knuckle exercise and traffic safety seems an oxymoron.
  Law of the asphalt jungle
  Each day, more than 4 million vehicles jockey for position along narrow lanes that wind through ancient bazaars or boulevards originally designed for the horse-drawn carriages and stately cars of India's British colonial elite.
  Rules of the road exist but mainly on paper. On the streets, it's the law of the jungle.
  Bus drivers cut off motorcyclists, truckers dodge cows, entire families squeeze onto a single scooter, three-wheel "auto rickshaws" zip in between everyone else, and those on foot utter prayers and curses in equal measure.
  It's a raucous free-for-all where the most important piece of advice is found painted on the backs of taxis and trucks: "Horn please."
  "They drive like they're pedestrians. If it's faster to go the wrong way up the street, they'll do it. They have no sense of danger," said one exasperated British executive who ventures out behind the wheel only on weekends. "You have to be vigilant all the time."
  Extra danger in the dark
  In 2004, Delhi Traffic Police logged 9,083 accidents, in which 1,832 people died. That's an average of five auto-related fatalities a day in a city that boasts 14 million people - but only 2.6 million licensed drivers, a Transportation Ministry official said.

  Many accidents here occur at night, when some motorists drive with their lights off, in the belief that their car batteries will last longer.
  The chaos on New Delhi's streets is at least partly explained by the findings of the study published last month by economists from Harvard University, the University of Chicago, New York University and the International Finance Corp., an arm of the World Bank.  
  The scholars were commissioned to look into the effects of government corruption. Their report, "Does Corruption Produce Unsafe Drivers?" (answer: yes), has cast an unflattering light not just on the menace lurking on New Delhi's streets but also on India's Kafkaesque bureaucracy and the dishonesty it has spawned.
  Clandestine payoffs or special favors smooth the way for buying property and acquiring government ration cards, among other things. They secure places in good schools for your children, ensure you prompt attention at the hospital, provide you access to bank loans, exempt you from local building codes.
  "The whole country is deep in corruption," said N.S. Venkataraman, an activist in the southern city of Chennai, formerly known as Madras. "Corruption is there from one end to the other."

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Umesh Sharma
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Ed.M. - International Education Policy
Harvard Graduate School of Education,
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Class of 2005

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