Subir Roy: Rashtrapatiji, give Bangalore a break

OFF BEAT

Dear Rashtrapatiji,

It was nice to have you again among us, though you do come quite often. Before everything else, I would like to thank you for the pledges that you made the girls of a prestigious city school take.

Their lives will have a newer focus with the targets you have given them "" every year help a few become literate, a few to get rid of their addictions, and plant a few saplings. Things like these show how much of a common-man's president you are.

But strictly between the two of us, can you do Bangalore a favour by coming here a little less often? I am sure you will take this in the spirit in which it is not intended.

It is not that we love you less but simply that Bangalore cannot take it any more. A VVIP visit such as yours throws everything out of gear even more than the permanent chaos in which they are these days. Just see what happened to my wife and I the morning you came.

I had to drop her to the airport before going to NIAS (the superb think-tank that Raja Ramanna helped set up) to talk to a set of fellow journalists.

She almost missed her flight and I had to facetiously tell my audience that I was delayed as the President had held me up.

There was chaos on stretches of Airport Road because some of the minor crossings had no policemen. Where were they? We could see them all lined up along your route, dressed in their best uniforms, with little tags on their chests indicating they were on VVIP duty.

Little did they know that you would have been appalled if you came to know that police bandobast for you was causing so much hardship to laypeople.

At one stage, after dropping my wife, I almost breathed a sigh of relief as the traffic began to move slowly but the jam was back again soon.

It took me a bit of time to realise what had happened. A convoy of Contessa cars was proceeding to the airport to stand-by on duty as you came in. One of the policemen in one of the vans accompanying this land Armada had jumped out, regulated traffic for just a little while so that the Contessas could pass the crossing and then got into his van and was gone, leaving us to our fate.

When you have several engagements in town in a single day's visit, can you imagine the chaos it causes all around?

I know you love Bangalore but do ask friends living there about the state of the city. My experience will tell you that it does not have the most intelligent police officers in the country.

So they mostly end up worsening rather than relieving the traffic jams that beset the city even without the VVIP visitors and get worse by the day. The state government that came to power a few months ago inherited a city of gardens and has quickly turned it into a city of potholes. They told us the potholes would go once the rains went.

The rains are virtually gone but the potholes have not. You exhorted your fellow countrymen to bring urban amenities to rural areas; they are trying to bring rural amenities to urban areas!

Come to think of it, why don't you do something about this traffic disruption that every VVIP movement causes? They say even the VVIP, not to speak of the hugely clever police bara sahibs, have no choice as the modalities of security layout for VVIPs is laid down by law.

I know that you know nothing should be done for the VVIP security that creates such hardship for ordinary road-users. But the law is such an ass.

As I ruminated over all this, a great idea struck me. You do have the power to change the law. This is how! Few things in government move without your say-so. Why don't you throw down the gauntlet, give the Central government an ultimatum? Pass an ordinance to change the law to change the rules regarding VVIP security so that they don't end up causing misery to all ordinary road users.

Or else, you will go on a pen-down strike, not add your dhobi mark to all those orders that are issued in your name and bills that have to enter the statute books.

Talking of airport roads, my Delhi friends tell me that there is indeed a change in the capital. VVIPs going to Palam do not disrupt traffic the way they used to. Why can't we bring this culture to the states? You could tell the states: follow Delhi's example or else I won't make a visit.

There was talk of building a helipad near Raj Bhavan in Bangalore so as to spare the Airport Road VVIP visit-induced chaos. But rumour has it that the VVIPs who are patrons of the Bangalore Turf Club nicely scuttled the idea once a little corner of the club was identified for the helipad.

One of them told me that though actual races were held only on specified days, helicopters would disturb the horses while they took their constitutionals! I know that would be cruel to the horses so why not shift the turf club to the outskirts of the city, for which, too, there is a proposal?

In reply, he told me in all seriousness that any government in Karnataka that has tried to shift the racecourse has itself got shifted out.

So the best thing is to for you to stay away from Bangalore for some time until it sorts out its traffic problems. Instead, I will drop by and say hello to you the next time I am in Delhi.

Sincerely,

sub@business-standard.com