Let the pandemic teach us traffic discipline, too

Photo used for representational purpose. Pic/AFP

It is unfortunate but true that it has taken a pandemic to inculcate discipline and teach us some lessons.

The Mumbai traffic police found 35 cases of drink and drive on December 31, while there were 4,056 cases of other traffic violations. The drink and drive cases are much lower as compared to December 31, 2019, in all probability due to the COVID-19 pandemic-related curfew, a report in this paper said.

Some number crunching will make our points clearer. On December 31, 2019, 677 cases of drink and drive were made and licences of offenders were suspended for six months.

This December 31, traffic police booked 35 people for drink and drive.

Traffic police on the ground said people who had ventured outside to celebrate at places did heed police announcements about the curfew and left for their homes to get back in time. The overall sentiment was that there was general cooperation with the police.

We need this to become a staple, outbreak or not, in order to have a more orderly and safer city on all days.

While numbers are bound to be lower, given that there were fewer people on the roads, can we see this kind of consideration when we have traffic at full capacity? This should surely make us introspect that though numbers have dipped because of circumstances, aiming for this graph where numbers nosedive for the good of people everywhere, is the need of the hour.

Along with some key takeaways from the enforced timeout because of Coronavirus, this should be a big one and worthy of emulation. Life sent us back to the drawing board last year. And hopefully, we will learn some new lessons, with traffic discipline topping that chart.