By Aasif Rathore
Who am I to write about it. Everyone who is on the wheel and who is adjacent to the seat or behind it knows everything about it even if that person doesn’t know how to execute the skill. We, yes we the people of Kashmir have our own rule book titled “Kashur Daiver te baki luk”
A few days ago, while scrolling I saw a clip wherein someone was showing hacks of driving. Like how to determine how far your car is from an object. I recalled we have Rule of “Tche haz neri “ for that, by which you are able to pass your Car even when there is no space, yes there will be a little scratch or may b a dent and even scratch to other Cars, which may extend to bodily injury and paying compensation.
“TCHE HAZ NERI” is a slang which has so many meanings depending on how you take it. A Driver can take it as a compliment, or a taunt. One who says it, can be wrong obviously. But you have to trust in order to come out of the situation. In such a situation shut your ears and concentrate on your driving if you love your Car. There are as many slangs as many situations you would be facing as a driver. It is not just in Kashmir, but the situation is same all over India.
The most popular word of the century is traffic, with suffixes and prefixes. When we hear it we get an image of traffic mess. To be more precise, traffic is a disciplined movement of vehicles, traffic jam is when the movement is at temporary halt and the journey may take a little more time. Then there is traffic mess, we may not know the rules of driving but yes we do know rules of traffic mess.
What do you call that poor guy who stops his Car before the mandatory Stop line at the Traffic light or who follows lane driving, allows people to cross road, uses indicator, low beam, switches off engine on halt, wait before calling him anything, let’s spare a moment to respect such driver? But after watching people overtaking him and yelling at him for following traffic rules, he even calls himself a fool and pledges not to be a good driver again.
To my understanding and having two decades of driving experience, which is like a study in itself, I have got a few hacks to avoid creating the mess. The word HACKS rolled your eyeballs but CREATING MESS following the word was bit rude. Someone saying we have decades old roads is either saying it because he isn’t a driver or knows driving but follows decade old driving rules, like as it was considered offence to pass on left, such people follow same old rules, when we are having two lanes, three and four lanes in some parts of valley.
The first hack is to draw two imaginary lines on left and right of your road. Imaginary line for the reason that even Sarkar is not inclined to regulate it and waste paint on our roads, they are following “WATEN TCHA TCHAKUN”. The reason we are not used to lane driving, walk on zebra crossings. We don’t have lane division marks, turn marks, stop marks. Back to hack, don’t drive close to the right imaginary line i.e. divider, leave space equal to vehicle behind you so that other vehicle cannot pass or drive close to the left imaginary line (middle line) of the road. This helps you in denying the other cars to make another lane in your lane, other benefit, it prevents other negligent driver to make sudden overtake from your left. And it makes way to bikers on your right and your bumpers are safe. Don’t be scared of horns, your lane is yours except if there is an emergency vehicle behind you. Consider yourself lucky if the driver behind you follows it, if he does your whole lane is safe.
How about following rule of keeping safe distance? This should be done at least three metres (10ft) behind the car ahead of you, as any less than that may be difficult to stop in time when faced with an unexpected emergency situation, such as, like in valley without crossings, people cross roads by showing hand or another car suddenly overtaking you or driving out into the road ahead of you unexpectedly at high speed. And in narrow lanes when the traffic is stuck, so that driver in front of you will be able to reverse a bit if need arises.
A pot hole may do a little damage to the vehicle but if you move the vehicle all of sudden you may cause greater loss. Imagine a biker on blind spot of your vehicle. Be gentle on steering.
Yes, we all know using a mobile phone behind the wheel is more dangerous than drunk driving.
They say ignorance of law is no excuse. Be alert, and aware, educate yourself and others too.
The writer is Advocate by profession and can be reached at aasifrathore@gmail.com
