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Improper policing

Though the National Highways leading into Delhi constitute its arteries as far as the traffic flow is concerned, the way the crossings and traffic signals thereon are managed by the police leaves a lot to be desired. In the absence of proper traffic management, these lifelines get clogged and disrupt traffic movement over long stretches of the approach roads.

Still, unmindful of the effect improper policing has on the traffic situation, at many intersections traffic police personnel choose to ignore violations by motorists and other road users that have a severe adverse impact on the vehicles taking that route.

A case in point is the Ghazipur Crossing on National Highway 24 through which thousands of residents bound for East Delhi and beyond commute every day. Here following a review of the vehicular flow, right turn was banned for vehicles moving from the Mayur Vihar Phase II side towards the Delhi-Uttar Pradesh border.

But this does not prevent people from brazenly flouting the rule right in front of the police personnel who sit near the traffic box on an isle and ignore such violations taking place under their nose. While sometimes there is an alert cop who stands right at the crossing to prevent violations -- paving the way for smoother movement of vehicles -- such actions remain only in the realm of aberrations rather than norms.

No one seems to realise that a vehicle trying to take a right from the crossing blocks the way of an entire row of vehicles coming behind it. And then as other vehicles try to pass by it, there is a lot of lane-changing which further hampers the movement of traffic on the entire corridor. As it is, National Highway-24 here has only two lanes and so any disruption in the traffic flow has a cascading effect over a long length of the highway. The need of the hour is proper traffic management and challaning of vehicles that break the rules with impunity.

-- Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar

Tough time for scribes

Journalists covering the New Delhi Municipal Council, the civic body in charge of Lutyens' Delhi, are facing a tough time accessing its headquarters at Palika Kendra these days thanks to a directive issued by NDMC chairperson Sindhushree Khullar disallowing entry of scribes without an entry pass.

So every time a journalist has to meet an official, he or she has to wait for turn to get a pass made. The reception staff calls up the official to confirm whether the journalist has an appointment. It is only after this that he or she is allowed to enter the multi-storey building. Surprisingly, the rule at Palika Kendra applies only to journalists.

What's even more surprising is that the NDMC security personnel and private guards deployed at the gate do not even allow entry to journalists who possess identity cards issued by the Press Information Bureau or the Delhi Government. They insist that journalists who want to get entry without the pass should get a new identity card made from the civic body's Public Relations Department.

Sore over the unfair treatment meted out to them, journalists who cover NDMC have now decided to take up the matter with the Press Council of India and the Union Government. "We have to visit the NDMC office almost daily for reports, but instead of checking our publications' identity cards we are made to stand in queues to get entry passes. Ms. Khullar had earlier promised to look into the matter but nothing has happened. Never has such a thing happened in the history of the civic body," rued a journalist working for a national daily.

-- Sandeep Joshi

Remembering Rajiv

An unusual new website, "rememberingrajivgandhi.com", to pay tributes to former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi has been launched.

Developed by Harish Chandra, the portal was inaugurated by Union Minister of State Oscar Fernandes recently. It contains 160 photographs, 43 illustrations and 78 chapters on Rajiv Gandhi right from the time when he was an airline pilot to the period when he was Prime Minister of the country. The human facets of Rajiv Gandhi, largely unknown to the people at large, are exhibited at the website.

-- Staff Reporter

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