Hot summer - Cool Hyderabad

Just like any other day, life started at 8 in the morning. Having read Economic Times to showcase some intelligence during MBA has increased the aversion for no-gossip-only-business papers. I grabbed the regional daily and riffled through it to quickly come to film section. Boring reading was followed by an eventful swimming.

I came back home hitting upon some friends by the noon to eagerly take a mouthful of what mom cooks. After the tummy protruded out and it no longer managed another droplet of water or a grain of rice, I decided to enjoy my siesta. It was when I reclined that I remembered an old friend’s last working day in Hyderabad. It really is a token of respect to attend his farewell.

The stretch across Jubilee Hills to Madhapur is really a nice drive ( but only during the afternoons or the offbeat hours).

One thing I really like in Hyderabad is the sheer arrogance they show in abiding the traffic rules. Ok! I am not so much into rules as what you need at the end of the day is mutual understanding and that is how it works in Hyderabad.

A junction moderated by a traffic police always lead to long queues and improper scheduling while the same junction in the absence of a traffic guy is no bottle neck.

The bigger roads have 2-3 lanes clearly demarcating them for 2,3,4… wheelers.

However, freedom to happily to cross over lanes is the best part as it takes you to your destination very quickly. Many a 2 wheelers are seen mostly on the express lanes. Cybertowers provides a bird’s eye view to the car-RTC bus maneuvers by the middle lanes.  Majority of times is the slow lane and footpath used by those to come in the wrong (opposite) direction to create the element of surprise for those waiting on the same. They pave ways for shorter routes and now it is hidden rule to come in the opposite direction along the slow lanes.

On any day the lanes are used liberally by us. Clearly it is so much fun here..

These roads have nice dividers all along with reasonably tall buildings over look the traffic rush alongside.  Traffic signals are only a hindrance as they waste the precious 20 -30 seconds of our valuable time and hence, they are never really practised.

Well, to add more Orange light is used to increase your speed to quickly cross over the signal while you start off 5- 7 signals before the green pops up. Only the disadvantaged stop at the red signal.

I steered on the same roads to catch up with my friend. The entire city has changed so much post 2000. Roads of Madhapur are now the one-stop destination for everything ranging from sanitary and hardware shops to IT hubs. Most of the traffic during the working hours ( 11 A.M. – 4 P.M.) is due to the call cabs and the shuttle taxis. I was in no rush to meet my friend. I moved rather slowly compared to my fellow traffic-mates. I almost reached the destination and it only required 2 more minutes when I saw a cute puppy ( stray dog) that tried crossing the road to catch up some sleep under the tree on the other side. We, the so-called rational animals, have never followed any rules and how would an immature, stray dog, that barely managed to understand the world we are in, would know where to cross the road?

This con cab in front of me could have easily avoided or waited for the dog to clear its timid crossing across the road. Oh no… waiting for a second would lead to a catastrophe. So, the cab continued at the same pace. Inefficient reflexes for this 5-7 month old could not help in avoiding the speeding car

                                     and the dog rolled under the tyres of the mammoth.

The driver of the cab did not even have that sympathy to stop over and quickly see for a proper course of action. Neither did the 20-30 other guys sealed under helmets or Air conditioned cars had the compassion for the same. There were just two people on that  road which had NIFT and big corporate on either side that took the dog to the footpath. Mind was totally totally blank after that tragic accident. There was no blood anywhere while one side of the dog was totally peeled off. Its tongue stuck out and made hiccups. I quickly got water from my vehicle while making calls to Bluecross. Puppy was on my lap in my arms and I was helpless for its condition as I couldn’t alone take it anywhere neither was any one interested to look at its plight. After 20 seconds, the eyelids were  ajar and the hiccups stopped.

It took me 5 more seconds to realize that it was its heartbeat that STOPPED.

Ahh!!! What a painful death for the little one which was under the false impression that people would wait or help it get some sleep.

It is now asleep forever.

I rose from that site and could

• hear the same horns,
• see vehicles moving past
• and observe people around just uninterested with the fiasco.

The drive for the next two minutes seemed really long!

Lack of discipline is tolerable but lack of compassion is not!

PS: The corpse lied there even after one day of the accident or death. Taking it to the graveyard is not I could have helped, but, …