‘High flying’ dangers in Sitabuldi
07 Feb 2020 10:18:36
By Biraj Dixit :
BLISSFULLY unaware – An idiom usually associated with easy inattentiveness and carefree distraction can be truly nerve-wrecking for its life-threatening propensities on a busy road. But places after places, roads after roads bear testimony of this blissful unawareness where it is not just suicidal but can also be murderous. The ‘Adivasi Shahid Gowari Uddanpul’ or the Sitabuldi Flyover, our city’s first brush with development taking a skyward turn, was completed in December 2000.
To save fuel, many riders risk their lives while taking the flyover from wrong side. (Pics by Satish Raut)Two decades later, the flyover, once a symbol of strong development, seems a thing of past as a Metro line passes above it. So much has changed. Stubbornly intact, however, are the die-hard habits of remaining blissfully unaware. The flyover was originally built to ease traffic in the ever-busy Sitabuldi and on the very busy Wardha road. As it serves its purpose, the flyover, too, watches in utter disbelief the havoc wreaked upon by this state of blissful unawareness. The flyover allows one to accelerate and reach one’s destination quickly. But there are speed limits – on the higher side and on the lower side too. As often as one sees vehicles zoom past and breakneck speed, one can also remember witnessing those who glide ease on the side of the narrow road talking on their cellphones as the racing vehicles behind screech themselves to a slower speed, so as not to bang.
(Above) Heavy vehicles plying on flyover, riders taking wrong lane beside it as a row of parked vehicles leave little space for even the regular traffic in front of The Hitavada office on Wardha Road. (Below) With traffic moving in fast pace, pedestrians casually risk their lives to cross the entire stretch of the opening of the flyover.
The cell-phone talker, meanwhile, is blissfully unaware that his life depended so heavily on the fellow rider’s ability to apply brakes on time. The volley of expletives and cuss words that follow too fall on the deaf ears of the blissfully unaware mobile talkers. Agreed, the setting sun looks breathtaking from the flyover, but that does not mean one applies sudden brakes to admire its beauty and actually take away others’ breath. The panorama of a moving city below with its glowing lights must be a sight to behold, but simply parking one’s vehicle on a running road to enchant oneself with the view below is stretching the concept of being blissfully unaware to murderous proportions. With the lights on the flyover extremely dim, it’s really hard to spot parked vehicles on flyover. Many accidents have happened because of such thoughtlessness, but people take no lessons.
One has to give it to the ingenuity of people who invent purpose and utility for things that their original planners and designers never even dreamt about. For example, the engineers who built the Metro bridge above flyover might not have thought in their wildest dream that they were actually also creating a huge umbrella. If rain has caught them off guard, people think it their august duty to let others too feel its cascading effect – of being caught off guard! So, caught off guard, are the racing vehicles that climb up the flyover from the Sitabuldi side as immediately above is a bunch of two-wheelers standing put to save themselves from the rains. But the nastiest thing that happens is a fellow driver riding or driving at breakneck speech, honking hard and then overtaking from the left side.
Such pursuits, often for the pleasure of the headless souls, have in past taken lives. The most deadly specimen on the flyover are the U-turners. They are blissfully unaware and woefully undecided. Recently, a saree wearing lady on a two-wheeler took the flyover from the Sitabuldi side and then decided against climbing further. So, she stopped. The vehicles coming from behind shrieked and screeched and squealed and screamed and the entire show behind her came to a grinding halt. Realising what had happened, the show-stopper offered a coy smile and walked her moped on the other side, stopping the show on the other side of the flyover.
Adding a few more brickbats to the glory of women riders, the lady raced her way out. A youth who rashly took a U-turn banged right into an incoming biker and the two got dragged along a distance of a few meters and stopped inches from a young girl on moped who screamed at the approaching horror. Equally dreadful are the pedestrians who can think of no harm as they venture to cross the flyover. Almost always will one find them looking on the wrong side while crossing. This situation is particularly dangerous when someone appears on the road from small openings at the lower end of the flyover. With lights so dim, they become visible only when one comes too near. Adding to the chaos are the heavy vehicles, inexplicably allowed on the flyover.
The barricades denying entry to heavy vehicles have gone missing for years. The blissfully unaware show does not end on the flyover, it carries on at the descent near Rahate Colony square. Too lazy to take a U-turn towards Janata square, many simply turn the wrong way and carry on towards Dhantoli, in front of The Hitavada office. Traffic from Janata square to Rahate Colony has an additional responsibility of taking care of these wrong-lane mavericks. Many accidents and minor mishaps later, nothing has changed. The bliss continues!