New Delhi, Sep 22 (Inditop.com) Delhi authorities and experts Tuesday welcomed Home Minister P. Chidambaram’s advise to Delhiites to change their behaviour before the 2010 Commonwealth Games, saying steps are being taken to bring such changes.
“I fully agree with the home minister’s views and Delhi definitely needs a change for it to become a world class city in all possible terms. We have already started efforts for this via our schemes and coordinating with the RWAs (resident welfare associations). We welcome and support his viewpoint and are striving to achieve the same,” Delhi Mayor Kanwar Sain told Inditop.
Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit took the cue and said a campaign will soon be launched to make people in the national capital aware about the need for behavioural changes.
Earlier in the day, Chidambaram said Delhiites needed to change some of their habits if visitors to the Commonwealth Games next year were to carry a good impression about the host city.
“We cannot expect mega city policing to function properly if people do not change their behaviour. We still find vehicles jumping red lights – and police vehicles are not excluded, they too jump red lights,” Chidambram said after inaugurating 22 new police stations in the capital at a function.
“There are vehicles running without registration plates, some are crossing roads where they should not. People are not using overground or underground passes. We want to encourage people to change their mindset,” the home minister said.
Transport expert V.K. Arora said the government should take stringent measures.
“The home minister is true as we need to learn etiquettes while driving or crossing roads. In India, enforcement makes people work and the government should take stringent measures to ensure that people follow traffic rules,” said Arora, who is a transport expert with Safety and Quality Forum of Institute of Engineers.
Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) also recently inaugurated a communication and skills training programme for its drivers and conductors.
Nearly 1,500 drivers and conductors were selected for the 40-day-long first phase of communication and skills training programme.
While some residents welcomed the home minister’s advise, others said the government was slow “as always” in realising the basic issues.
“The decision to organise Commonwealth Games was taken years ago. But, the government has realised it only now that people need a crash course in behaviour,” wondered 27-year-old marketing executive Anshul Sharma.
“Not just Delhi, but the whole country needs a crash course in basic manners and politeness. And the change should start from the government officers and politicians. To talk of changing the behaviour ahead of the Commonwealth Games sounds ridiculous,” said Chavi Aggarwal, a BPO employee.
Mudit Mittal, 25, supported Chidambaram’s suggestion wholeheartedly.
“I completely agree with our home minister’s views. People in Delhi lose their temper at the drop of hat, which results in fights and sometimes casualty. Not just games, authorities should focus on such programmes beyond that. Also why only Delhi, it should be for the complete country,” said Mittal.
A young public relations professional, Jayanti Narang said: “With the current state of affairs, the perennial traffic chaos and the way people behave are awful. I hope that taking the Commonwealth Games as an excuse, a change is brought about in the national capital. We shouldn’t do this for the visitors during the Games, we should do it for ourselves.”
