Couple of weeks back, the Telangana Regional Transport Authority (RTA) made it mandatory to purchase helmets before your 2-wheelers can get registered. Definitely a well intentioned move to promote road safety. However, the roll-out and execution of this plan has been very poorly managed.
Waiting in the RTA office with all documents ready to register my two-wheeler, it was a nightmare to see the local official walk into office and past a 'new circular' that was active with immediate effect. This mandated all 2-wheelers to be sold with a helmet, and hence all registration documents had to furnish this new bill. Vehicle Showrooms & agents were clueless about this and people scrambled to comply by getting their invoice bills re-printed, in case they had already bought a helmet with the vehicle. What should have been a straightforward 30-minute registration process wasted over half a day in the confusion, for most people who were office-goers.
Interestingly, the Indian 'jugaad' fix-it-all adapts fastest to such bureaucracy and responds with amazing alacrity. In hardly a couple of hours, the agents had modified their 'rate card' to include this new 'product' to make some more money:
Registration without license : Rs. 500
Registration without helmet : + Rs. 300
What should have resulted in more people buying helmets and improving adoption, ended up as a money-making scheme for agents and local officials. Perhaps, it calls for a lot more than plain 'noble intention' to do some public good.
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