Driving on Pune Roads

Its been almost 6 months of me driving a vehicle, for the first time in my life. I never owned a vehicle before, although I have tried to ride few bikes and scooters. This was the first time I got to drive my two wheeler on a daily basis. It was indeed a learning experience, about how to drive and how others drive. I have made some observation of people on pune roads. These may be affected by my personal skills in driving.

1) Be very afraid of all the autowallahs on the road. They don’t follow any traffic rule and would expect you to not follow too. They take turns without giving indicators and lane driving is as alien to them as sub atomic physics. Their ego is too big and they can fight ferociously even if they took a reverse in a packed traffic jam without giving any gestural or digital indication. I strongly suggest you to not come in their way or conversation.

Similar observation can be made for 40 something uncles driving high end cars. With their costly cars, they might have bought the road itself. They will keep honking you to give them way, even if there is nothing in the way to go ahead. They’ll change lanes without indicating and drive at night with goggles on and head-lights on high beam!

2) People who are crossing the roads are very meek and fragile beings and you have to take the responsibility that they cross the road safely. You might as well consider them blind, deaf and dumb. They will look on the wrong side while crossing the road, wont ever pay any heed to the horn of your bike and might even stop in the middle of the road and change the speed or direction of their course. Before going ahead, you should make sure that they have crossed the road and now have no intention of returning back with an increased vigor.

3)Another category is guys belonging to 25-28 years of age, owning high speed bikes, driving without helmets and sometimes accompanied with the bent torso of a hot girl on their backseat. They are mostly harmless beings, they know how to drive and how to drive really fast. They won’t honk at you to give them side, they’ll twist, turn and make their own way around you. The only scary thing is you might lose your own balance when they are crossing you really fast.

4) And how can I forget the bus-drivers. Their bus is sometimes as wide as the road itself. And in the case of ravivar peth,  the bus is wider than the road. In one particular street of ravivar peth when the bright red government bus arrives, pedestrians have to get inside the shops to avoid getting hit by the bus.

If the roads aren’t auto wallah’s property, they definitely are bus-wallahs’. If you see such a local bus around you, you better slow down your vehicle and take the right lane and stay away from them for our own good. You won’t realise when the bus changes the lane and stops near a bunch of restless people you would’nt have guessed to be a bus stop. Stay away, stay safe!

I might have be on the verge of paranoia because of the pathetic rush on the roads, but I have learnt my way well and my skills are constantly improving. And it feels nice to have written a post after such a long time!

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