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-   -   Are there headlight norms in India? (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian-car-scene/275529-there-headlight-norms-india-3.html)

I feel the menace of high beam is increasing day by day. Is it ignorance or general apathy towards fellow drivers? I’m quite saddened and surprised by the trend now that many drivers don’t even change to low beam even if you flash a few times to remind that they are on high beams and making me blind.

The high beam menace is especially more severe in Bangalore, and I have come to realize that it is because of extremely poor streetlighting in very many areas in Bangalore. This "poor streetlighting" is a problem unique to Bangalore, amongst all Tier 1/2 metro cities. And this has been the case for decades, and hence an entire generation has grown up in Blore seeing poor streetlighting and driving with high-beam. You don't see the high-beam menace so much in Mumbai, Thane and Delhi, as much as you see it in Bangalore.

Not that I am condoning high beam drivers. Instead of slowing down in reduced visibility (which is the right behavior), they turn on their high-beam in an effort to drive fast. Very bad!

In Bangalore, if the city fathers are able to consistently provide reliable streetlighting, then I'm sure some of the high-beam offences will reduce over a decade.

Meanwhile, yes, I agree, we do need laws ASAP to punish such offences. Its very dangerous for others, and tantamounts to insensitive driving and a complete lack of driving-etiquette.

What's worse is people plonking brighter bulls into crappy domes or fitting crappy aftermarket reflectors itself that barely put any light on the road. Yes, its bright when you look at it and yes, its scatters light everywhere disturbing everyone around but damn things don't actually put any light on the rad. Somehow the owners are very oblivious to this.

Implementation details:

If I am a Traffic Police, I would not sign up to catch high beam offences. I would go blind in a day. I would rather catch one, and get that person to catch 5 for me, thereby educating, and making them pay with their time.

I once gave this idea to the traffic station folks near my house, and they said that they were the wrong people I was talking to, and I had to talk to a commissioner sitting somewhere else, and these people can only follow orders.

Then, there is the rule that the traffic police cannot stop anyone in the middle of the road. They are supposed to only book fines using cameras with photo evidence. Haven't you noticed that traffic police don't stop anyone these days. They have left it to the cameras do the job for them. If you go to the portal, you will see lakhs of offenders getting booked, and there is no good intimation, deadline to pay fines.

Will it change anytime soon? Not during the elections. And this is not such a big issue for the government to get into. They are not getting any votes because of this.

And there is no association that is making noise about it. News papers are not talking about it. I pity those cab drivers. They are the ones who are hurt the most. Most of us on Team BHP can avoid one way or the other, but they cannot. Yet they are not educated enough to understand "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind"

I guess I am a certifiable dinosaur.

Only once has this high beam menace been effectively brought under control in Hamara Bharat Mahaan: That was when Kiran Bedi was DCP Traffic in New Delhi (around 1979-1983, I think).

I remember roadside stalls on then-borders of then-Union Territory of Delhi that painted the top half of all headlights black. This was effective and implemented diligently. Drivers grumbled but agreed. Every time they entered Delhi, no blinding lights hitting the eyes. :Cheering: Every time they left, all they had to do was scrape off the paint.

(Jugaad experts (innovators) then started taping off the top half the headlights, made removal even easier, except during monsoons when the tape would just fall off randomly.)

In today's world, not going to happen. Just the memory made me smile. :)

I can hope, can I not?

Drive safe.

The painted headlights were a menace of its own, way into 90s. I was living in Ghaziabad till 97 and whenever you cross Border from UP to Delhi, some people will jump in front of your car, paint your headlights black and ask money for doing so. They used runny paints that will mess all of your headlight, drop some on bumper and put painted hand stains all over the bonnet. My father used to keep a stick in his car to deterrent such frauds.

LED lamps just sucks, I have astigmatism, and I really hate driving behind a swift with LED tail lamps.

I would add my two cents. The social media lighting 'experts' are doing no favours to anyone. Retrofitting poorly aligned projectors in headlights, aux lights that point to the sky and fog lights akin to lighthouses all designed to dazzle the oncoming traffic. Not to mention, Led in reflector housing which do nothing but spread the light instead of focus it.

And matters are made worse by OEM's proving poor quality headlights. My seltos's lights are like candles during rains or highways. And while fitting aux lights, i was shocked by the response of the shop. He verbatim told me to aim the lights higher for better 'throw' and he told me a particular model would 'stadium ki tara chamkadegi'. I had to work hard to convince him that there is a alignment process and that needs to be carried out. Wonder how many consumers go around without proper alignment.

This is what I had been saying. Today I saw a vehicle which jumped the signal, and neither were wearing helmets, in the heart of Indiranagar (Bangalore) right underneath a traffic camera. I remembered the registration number and checked the traffic fines app for the same.
It had around 70 violations of all kind, dating as far back as 2018, where fines were 100 rupees per offence.
And this person probably doesn’t even know that he is being booked for offences like “wrong number plate”, “parking on footpath”, “wrong side”, “helmet”, “signal jumping”, “no parking”.
I cannot find enough words to curse our traffic management. Neither can I find an emoji

Thanks for the information, I found it valuable. I really don't want the opposite party to feel uncomfortable because of my headlights. I have been living with the stocks on my 2016 creta all this while. I am now inspired by your post and looked up a 3500k H4 LED from Philips on Amazon. I hope they won't fake the temperatures they claim.

This seemed like a relevant thread to check: I heard today that after-market LED headlamps have come under increased scrutiny of late in Maharashtra, Gujarat, etc. recently, i.e. enforcement of laws has become more stringent.

On checking on Google, I'm not able to confirm that anything has changed very recently, so thought I will check with this forum. I upgraded the headlamps on my 2018 Baleno to Bosch LEDs recently, so a bit concerned.

Would be keen to get the thoughts of this esteemed forum!

The other day I was coming back home from work in the evening. Suddenly there was myriad of bright lights in my rear view mirror causing me to squint my eyes. For a second I thought I was caught in the blinding lights of a UFO out to get me.



Turns it was just a heavily modified Thar with brighter lights than tolerable. I mean you are in the city where street lights are not that bad what exactly is one trying to do here, blind the person in front of you?

Exactly most OEM LED headlights fails miserably to illuminate the road ahead & when it rains/fog they are absolutely non existent on tarmac roads. Only thing most OEM LED setups does exceptionally well is blinding oncoming traffic. Dont understand why these OEM Headlights dont have proper illumination, Beam patternscolor temperature or projector lenses according to indian driving conditions. Halogen bulbs of decade old cars offered much better illumination than modern LED headlamps. Government must also account for the headlamps perfomance while awarding safety rating in my opinion.