BOARD TO DEATH?

BY ADITHIMANASA

If you are not new to Bengaluru then you definitely know where the freedom park is. And if you know where the freedom park is, then you also know where Maharani College is. And if you happen to be one like me who commutes by bus, then you will surely know the Maharani College bus stop just before Kaveri Bhavan stop. The stop at Maharani College does have shelters, not one but two. But have you ever seen people under those shelters? 

Picture courtesy- www.hindu.com

May be once in a blue moon we get to see people under the shelter, or say when it’s pouring heavily!

Most of the time, you can see a huge crowd covering half the road during peak hours of the day; which  happens to be around 10 AM to 01 PM and 4 PM to 7 PM. School children, college goers, senior citizens, office people and a few who are new to namma city; all throng the stop. One would mistake them for protesters who take to the streets!

What could be the reason for such ambiguity among the commuters? Well, it’s because the BMTC buses never stop at the stop! Only a handful of prompt drivers stop the bus right in front of the shelter and wait for passengers to board. The rest just zoom away, to avoid getting trapped by a red signal. The road is not reserved for BMTC buses alone. There are four-wheelers, two-wheelers and three-wheelers honking throughout the stretch when the confused passengers run behind buses in vain, attempting to board them.

When you are in a hurry and you miss your bus thrice, you get into an auto rickshaw assuming that you’ll reach faster. But those same buses that sped away without stopping at Maharani College get stuck in traffic congestion just a little further, on the way to the corporation stop. So, even the auto rickshaw you are in has to wait for the buses to make way!

The competition between the buses and the trail of agitated passengers running behind it often leads to accidents and chaos. People yell at each other. Bus drivers and conductors hurl abuses at passengers.

But the drama never seems to cease. The ‘mega’ soap continues on a daily basis and many a passenger has become immune to the issue. For it has become his daily routine.

A few friends and I decided to do something about it. We surfed the internet and found a forum where we could lodge complaints about poor bus services. Euphoria! We were thrilled that we finally found a solution. We felt like we were some sort of change-makers!

But after reading all the complaints posted on the forum, we were totally blank. So many people had filed complaints on the very same issue. The complaints dated back to 2009! That meant… the forum just got more complaints as the days passed but no action or measure was ever taken. Would our complaint make any difference at all? Or would it increase the number of posts in the forum alone? We understood that searching for a solution was such a waste of time. We went back with a heavy heart.

It was time for us to leave for work and I had to catch a bus which would never stop at the Maharani College bus stop.