The Killng Groungds

I was driving down from Chennai to Salem yesterday. The route was Chennai – Dindivanavam – Villupuram – Ulundurpet – Kallakurichi – Attur – Salem.

It is a 4 laner from Chennai to Dindivanam. After that it is the old 2 laner – this stretch of road from Dindivanam to Ulundurpet (90 kms) may be rightfully called the killing grounds of TN. At least 2 major accidents everyday – god alone knows how many get killed from dusk to dawn.

This stretch was just overcrowded at one point of time. Now, a 4 laner is getting ready – work is in progress since early 2007. The old road has not been topped during this whole period. The road has just disintegrated and everybody has to take this one route to reach – Coimbatore, Salem, Erode, Tirupur in one side and Trichy, Madurai, Tirunelveli, Tuticorin and Nagercoil on the other side. It is also the access to Tanjore, Nagapattinam, Cuddalore and the entire east of TN.

Yesterday it was raining heavily right from Chennai to Salem. After I hit the old road, I could see an accident every 10 kms. A whole bus on its belly like a dead cockroach. Huge trailers broken like thin twigs. Small cars reduced to pulp. Trucks parked on the shoulder just sinking into the mud.

Traffic jams everywhere. Till a new road is built and is operational, the old road must be maintained. This is plain simple logic. 10 people killed everyday is a big thing. Nobody reports this and nobody cares. There are no proper “Take Diversion” sign boards anywhere. There are such huge ruts and potholes that a car driver has to think which one to avoid and which one the car can afford to plough into. For all this, the pace of the road is not slow by any means. It is a nerve wracking experience driving through this stretch. Whenever I come this way, my knee aches from the clutch, shoulders from the continuous zig zagging and rough drive. There is no watering place. Everything is dug up on both sides – no entering the by lane for a chaai and dhum.

There was a news article in NDTV this morning. “Fiat takes auto journalists on an Arctic tour in Sweden to prove the ruggedness of the Linea and the Grande’ Punto”.

Professional journalists are chasing sensations and the common man is left to become a citizen journalist to capture the woes of the common man. The whole concept of journalism today has moved from the classical, meaning the traditional news, to the sensational, meaning the production of news out of non news making things. The Tamil media is more concerned about the harangues and bad mouthings between the CM and the Ex CM, Vijayakanth and their whole families ranging from their sons to annis. There are hundreds of banners – good flex banners – of various political dramas – our Lion, our Tamil saviour, our Tamil saint, our Tamil revolutionary. But they don’t add up to much when it comes to saving people’ lives. The NDTV’s and the CNN’s run more programs than news coverage.

When I was in the traffic jam yesterday, my knee was aching, my back was aching, my head was aching. We had been at one spot for more than an hour – no policeman turned up to clear the mess. Every john was cutting in and out of the mess trying to find a way to wriggle through. There was a minor accident where a bus driver violated the queue and brushed a car. One of the doors of the car was gone. There was a big fight. Nobody went home or wherever they wanted to go for lunch. So many man hours lost, so many kilo liters of fuel lost.

An ambulance couldn’t get through. Its siren went off 15 minutes into the jam. Things just cooled off after the person or people in the ambulance died. I think it was the struggle in the ambulance that made us all animals. People were embarrassed and they just relaxed and sat back. No horns after that. It was dead quiet for 2 minutes or so after the siren was turned off. In the end I had dinner in Salem – 330 kms – 13 hours later. The siren is still searing through my head when I am writing this in the refuge of a quiet room.