The Caste System of India has been replaced by the Car System in
Stay with me, this makes sense.
At the top are the Cars:
This is a powerful class, and believe that all resources are meant for them or should be given to them as Dakshina.
2nd tier are the Motorized Two Wheelers:
This is the warrior class. They charge bold and brave past most obstacles. They take chances, and often are prey to it. However, as they aspire to the Car class, they too tend to believe that resources are MEANT for cars.
3rd tier are the buses
This is the trader class, the vast majority of people. They suffer many hardships but are resigned to their fate. They believe that the only way they can escape from the cycle of daily acrobatics of jumping off moving buses, transversing through moving traffic after being dropped in the middle of the road; is by moving up the chain… they aspire to buy a bike some day.
4th are the bicyclists:
This is the service class. They have no power, no right to space. They occupy the leftover space on the road. Each turn/change of lane is a life threatening event, and in the actual event of death, it is presumed that it WAS in fact the bicyclists fault, for BEING on the road that is meant for cars to begin with!
Recently a new system was introduced in
A system introduced because everybody undoubtedly ASPIRES to rise to the Car Class, and our roads can not hold that many cars, if we build more and more roads so that all cars could be in the various levels of road, the air would not be worth breathing.
The reaction of the car owners to the BRT was very similar if not IDENTICAL to the upper caste reaction to the ‘reservation system' introduced also not very long ago. While it IS the rise in the number of CARS, not buses causing the increased traffic congestion, car owners find it impossible to accept that they need to sit in a traffic jam consisting of cars, while buses move relatively freely. This reaction is almost amusing seeing that even if the BRT was NEVER introduced, these cars would be sitting in a traffic jam of similar duration in a matter on years ANYWAY owing to the rise of car ownership. So if the BRT has pre-empted the traffic conditions 2 years hence while still providing a way to get from place to place, one would expect a welcoming reaction…. But car owners would rather NOBODY get to their destination if they can’t.
So, back to my earlier comparison, the Upper caste/ Upper class seem to believe that all resources are primarily THIERS for the taking and everybody else must be grateful to receive the leftovers. Any attempt to equalize distribution goes against the very nature of the caste system ingrained as FAIR!
http://thecityfix.com/media-and-car-owners-take-on-brt-in-delhi/
7 comments:
Hmmm... the vast majority are not the traders, but the shudras, the manual workers. In some parts of India, like Bihar, traders fall in this category. In others they are upper-caste.
And the cyclists would then be the dalits. Along with the pedestrians.
But great fun. I love your imagination.
I sometimes use a traffic/road metaphor for the landscape of tribal languages, village dialects, regional languages and English in India. English being the expressway...
very glad you wrote this post. Really interesting observations.
It's really intruiging, and sometimes a little scary to see how easily our socio-religious systems correspond to everyday economic considerations! Not that I'm saying that your classification is correct, but more or less...
Studying history, social mobility is an important subject for us, so translating what happened in ancient and medieval times to what's happening right now is remarkably easy!
wait. I didn't say that right (got lost in my sentence). what i meant was the its its fascinating how easy it to relate social mobility of past and medieval to what's happening today...
language as inclusive or exclusive to a caste, names, the rights available to them... and now its what transport rights are available to them!
Shonu! I love the thought process, that is exactly what it boils down to ultimately.
In fact even the argument of the car owners against the Tata Nano is very similar...dont want those motorists or cyclists to ascend to the car class!
the classification has always been there in all walks of life...now its engineers, doctors, architects, designers and then futher classification in the above categories. but there is a sense of respect which makes the differences acceptable and hence useable.
the "caste:car" classification however has no sense of respect hence there is chaos. no one respects each other's space, this is to do with our ego.
As an industrial designer i feel responsible for letting this happen infact making it happen. We design the products which transforms people's lives with no civil responsibilty. there is no automobile company which talks about road safety, traffic rules. they spend crores on getting SRK to tell our consumers look how cool this car is and the basic form and function of the vehicle. it sucks!!
rapid bus transport is what i feel the right move at the right time, at least its making people think about the road they are driving in and the chaos they make( however the radio industry is making good trp's).
One can do a lot within this system, a lil innovation can help. the idea/ work that has gone behind making it happen has to be acknowledged. i think the sheila deekshit govt is atleast experimenting and tryiong to get things done for a start.
the design community needs to participate with the govt. which we often distance ourselves from.
shivani come back!!!
no more posts?
so busy you are?
waiting...
no post...long time?? ...i am waiting
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