Licenced to Kill & maim…

Valmiki Faleiro
 

 [This series began with a statement: that a larger share of blame for death and misery on Goa’s roads lay with road users, than with bad roads or increased traffic.  In subsequent pieces, we saw how - it was so. 

Let’s now turn to everybody’s pet target: Government and two crucial areas: lax licensing and poor enforcement. ]
 

 India and Egypt have several similarities: both are ancient civilizations, both have poverty and class disparities.  Goa, too, is like Egypt:  if you can start a car, engage it in gear, drive six metres forward (yes, METERS, not kilometres) and an equivalent distance in reverse, you’re an Egyptian – or Goan – licenced driver! 
 

Gone are the days when driving schools hardly existed in Goa.  And road fatalities were rare.  But there were men like Cruz and Dixit, who took stringent driving tests before issuing a licence.  They took you to Panjim’s Pe. Agnelo Road (the Altinho uphill) and made you stop at a steep road gradient.  Alighting, they placed a matchbox behind a tyre where the vehicle could slide in the hands of an inept driver.  You then had to start and move the vehicle forward.  If the matchbox crushed, so were hopes of a licence.  They didn’t quiz you on traffic signage from an office chart.  During the test, they intentionally asked you to enter a no-entry street, park in a prohibited zone, or speed beyond the limit of the yonder signboard.  Practical men! 
 

A frequent writer on Goa’s road scene, Antonio Pinto of Benaulim, holds – I think, accurately – that 90% of our licenced drivers would flunk a proper driving test.  Beginning with those who teach and licence!  Goa’s driving schools are a joke, much as driving tests are.  Elementary stuff like use of handbrakes, headlights, hazard blinkers, the accelerator-clutch combo on an uphill, parallel parking in reverse, even safe parking (like on slopes, where wheels are turned left, gear in first or reverse, handbrakes set) is seldom taught or examined. 
 

Driving schools thrive on RTO liaison.  Try going for a driving test directly.  “Come through a driving school,” the official will advise.  The root is rampant corruption, which starts at the top.  Transport Ministers demand and receive huge bribes for every appointment, promotion and posting of officers.  Border check posts generate fixed monthly kickbacks.  Bribe demand routes are myriad.   
 

About a decade ago, this rather mute Transport Minister hit a brainwave.  The department’s top hierarchy comprised, then, of a Director and two Assistant Directors.  Our smarty told the two Asst. Directors he would create posts and promote them to Deputy Directors...  for Rs.15 lakhs apiece.  In the process of promoting the two Asst. Directors, then in turn two Motor Vehicle Inspectors to the resultant vacancies of Asst. Directors, two Asst. Inspectors to the vacancies of Inspectors and recruiting two fresh Asst. Inspectors, the Minister pocketed close to a crore of Rupees!  Why blame MV Inspectors and Asst. Inspectors when they must pay every step of the way? 
 

*Smart Card* driving licences, high-security number plates, dealer-level online registration are all very fine for private pockets and public convenience, dear Pandurang-bab Madkaikar.  How about making Goa’s roads a wee bit safer?  Like with stricter licensing, putting young riders through CV Dhume’s programme (as I mentioned last Sunday), publishing a *mandatory* manual for road users (as I will mention next Sunday), instilling road discipline through proper enforcement – even negative marking for traffic offences? 
 

Enforcement!  Time was when men like late Venkatesh Kamat or Police ASI, Mario Valadares (who expired this week, heaven bless their souls!) disciplined traffic by sheer force of persona, less by the ticket, at times by the hand.  Single handedly.  Goa fortunately still has capable officers (names like SP Anita Rodrigues and Dy SP Rina Torcato spring to mind) but who will deploy them?  Traffic postings are remunerative; the highest bidder wins. 
 

Enforcement by police, RTO (and even by the high-profile RITES, once invited from Delhi, with radar-mounted interceptors) is perfunctory.  Token action aims at raising statistics and fines, not road awareness.  Interceptors stealthily lie in wait at unsuspecting points (near speed limit boards that are barely visible or sensible, for instance) with the transparent object of not educating but extorting fines.  Occasionally, one sees enforcement out in full force and aplomb … before the sahib’s birthday bash, a community festival, or on Police Flag Day!  
 

Tailpiece:  Some trivia from Dr. P.S. Pasricha’s book.  The first motor accident was in New York in 1896, when a car hit a bicycle and broke the cyclist, Mrs. Thoma’s leg.  The first speeding ticket was issued same year in Kent, England, to a guy who was thrice over the limit of 2 mph (and was flagged by a cop who chased him on bicycle.)  The first fatality was in London in 1899, when a driver failed to negotiate a turn on Grove Hill.  The first pedestrian killed was run over by a car as he stepped off a tram, in New York, same year.  The worst accident, Sept 13, 1971, was in England – 200 vehicles in a single pileup.  The worst driver was a 75-year male from Texas, USA: he got into No-Entry four times and caused six accidents within an hour, ended up paying ten fines … and into the Guinness Book of world records!

submitted to TGF by the author on May 20, 2006

[Valmiki Faleiro is a Margao based businessman who earlier worked as Staff Reporter for the erstwhile WEST COAST TIMES and later as Goa Correspondent with Mumbai's FREE PRESS JOURNAL Group, and the INDIAN EXPRESS newspaper.  He served as the President of the  Margao Municipality from 1985 to 1987. He has indicated that he hopes to return soon to full-time writing, with a special interest on certain aspects of Goan history.] 

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