[Mortis]

I wonder if Police even get PUC done for their vehicles ? Im assuming they are not exempt from this ?

[RajeVenu]

Originally Posted by shankar.balan

I think India needs to completely eschew this VIP
Culture.
After all these are just public servants, paid for by our tax money from the exchequer, and the politicians are merely elected representatives of the public, not leaders!
So what entitles them to be more equal than the rest of us who pay their salaries?

Time we, the common public stood up for our rights!

I am sorry to be quoting this post only and not the many others which have gone about flogging the defence personnel. We may be getting paid by your tax money but that doesn't give you the right to one upmanship. We the defence forces also pay tax by the way and it is TDS. You are not my master since you pay my salary so leave that at that..

Every soldier is disciplined and we are taught and follow defensive driving. When we are driving in a convoy we follow all the rules of being on the correct lane within the stipulated speeds but contrary to your understanding the other morons who share the same road don't have the patience and do practice overtaking or driving manoeuvres which are beyond the comprehension of the poor Army driver who also expects discipline from the environment.

As regards to the equality in question you cannot in your wildest dreams comprehend the challenges my job offers vis a vis a civilian and if I had some power vested in me I would love to offer you the life of a soldier for a few days to change your perspective. Please understand the term public servants before equating the defence forces.

So my humble request to members don't follow the trend and go about bashing the ethics, morality and discipline of A soldier, the sacrifices made by him far outweigh the contributions towards pay made by the majority of us.

I don't deny that there will be exceptions but if you find any traffic violations by a defence vehicle note down the number and inform at the nearest defence establishment, mechanisms are in place and the price to pay by defaulters is very high.
PEACE TO ALL.

[TaureanBull]

Originally Posted by shankar.balan

I think India needs to completely eschew this VIP
Culture.
After all these are just public servants, paid for by our tax money from the exchequer, and the politicians are merely elected representatives of the public, not leaders!
So what entitles them to be more equal than the rest of us who pay their salaries?

Time we, the common public stood up for our rights!

Well, the public servants too pay taxes and all TDS. They don't swindle money by hiding taxes. Don't get the notion that the public is paying them the salary. It's the nation which pays from its GDP.
In my opinion, non-public servants are no less defaulters. Kindly rise above branding people. Hypocrisy seems to be too common now a days.

[alpha1]

Originally Posted by RajeVenu

Every soldier is disciplined and we are taught and follow defensive driving. When we are driving in a convoy we follow all the rules of being on the correct lane within the stipulated speeds

I live in Pune.
We are surrounded by Cantonments.
I drive through the areas daily.
I would say a certain percent of the army vehicles (trucks, ambys, gypsies, personal cars, even taxis) are driven responsibly without much attitude, but the remaining are driven rashly and definitely with attitude -especially on the Cantonment board roads.


It looks like for this second half, what you have written only holds true while on battle duty.
One taxi driver told me quite bluntly that if he is carrying defense personnel, the passenger themselves fight with the PCB fellows in order to NOT pay the entry tax. What kind of discipline are we talking about? Power hungry? Throwing the weight around at helpless private vendor collecting tax on PCB's behalf?


###

The lesser I speak about the police, the better.

[Prodigy07]

A TN-21G registered Tata Sumo driven by a Police officer this morning on GST Road was driving with a 'I Don't care' attitude.

He abruptly cut me across the Saravana Stores Chrompet signal and then went to extreme right at Chromepet Bus Stop signal (where folks take a U-turn) and then happily whizzed passed in Red

[comfortablynumb]

Originally Posted by alpha1

I live in Pune.
We are surrounded by Cantonments.I drive through the areas daily..

Agree 100% with your post. I also drive through the cantonment and its' neighbouring areas daily, and the defence vehicles that brazenly flout traffic rules are the norm, rather than the exception.

[Lalvaz]

Originally Posted by RajeVenu

I am sorry to be quoting this post only and not the many others which have gone about flogging the defence personnel. We may be getting paid by your tax money but that doesn't give you the right to one upmanship.

With all due respect, asking for defence forces and police personnel to follow traffic rules unless they are on DUTY is not One upmanship. If they are as disciplined as you claim then this thread would not exist.

I don't deny that there will be exceptions but if you find any traffic violations by a defence vehicle note down the number and inform at the nearest defence establishment, mechanisms are in place and the price to pay by defaulters is very high.
PEACE TO ALL.

The problem is that the exceptions seem to be the norm, and that is worrying. However, appreciate you pointing out the redressal mechanism. For the benefit of the civilians here, could you also please elaborate on the penalties for breaking traffic rules, like breaking a signal or driving on the wrong side of the road, when not on DUTY.



Thank you in advance.

[TaureanBull]

Originally Posted by comfortablynumb

Agree 100% with your post. I also drive through the cantonment and its' neighbouring areas daily, and the defence vehicles that brazenly flout traffic rules are the norm, rather than the exception.

I guess you are saying that they are floating rules when others are following the rules? These people are more undisciplined than the others? The Pune city civilians are following the rules and these defence personnel are flouting the rules. Don't make me laugh. I have driven enough in Pune or other cities. You are just expecting them to be disciplined than others as you think you are paying taxes. They would be as disciplined as others if not more.

[comfortablynumb]

Originally Posted by TaureanBull

I guess you are saying that they are floating rules when others are following the rules? These people are more undisciplined than the others? The Pune city civilians are following the rules and these defence personnel are flouting the rules. Don't make me laugh. I have driven enough in Pune or other cities. You are just expecting them to be disciplined than others as you think you are paying taxes. They would be as disciplined as others if not more.

I am not saying anything even remotely resembling what you have written above - that is your interpretation.

I only agreed to what alpha1 wrote in reply to RajeVenu's post, because I see it on a DAILY basis, not once in a while.

Btw, it's flouting, not floating.

Cheerio.

[TaureanBull]

Originally Posted by comfortablynumb

I am not saying anything even remotely resembling what you have written above - that is your interpretation.

I only agreed to what alpha1 wrote in reply to RajeVenu's post, because I see it on a DAILY basis, not once in a while.

Btw, it's flouting, not floating.

Cheerio.

Yes. I also said what I see on daily basis in Pune city outside other areas. I interpret what you wrote. Still finding floating. I guess you were floating not flouting.

[RajeVenu]

Originally Posted by alpha1

I live in Pune.
We are surrounded by Cantonments.
I would say a certain percent of the army vehicles (trucks, ambys, gypsies, personal cars, even taxis) are driven responsibly without much attitude...


It looks like for this second half, what you have written only holds true while on battle duty.
One taxi driver told me quite bluntly that if he is carrying defense personnel, the passenger themselves fight with the PCB fellows in order to NOT pay the entry tax. What kind of discipline are we talking about? Power hungry? Throwing the weight around at helpless private vendor collecting tax on PCB's behalf.....

Sorry alpha I beg to differ, how many times have you seen a Defence vehicle in accident in your area or how many accidents you are aware of caused by defence vehicles.. I am sure it may not be nil but a miniscule amount compared to the chaos caused by other drivers. As you and another member has pointed out you regularly drive through cantt, may I ask if you are so concerned about the disobedience or flouting of traffic rules why don't you take an alternate route.. The answer my friend is that in spite of all this the cantt traffic is more orderly, the roads are better and congestion is less. If you are not aware, the cantt roads are not maintained by PWD but from defence budget. So you pay the entry tax to use the road of cantt, I am sure if you are in the place of a soldier who is running late for office and others are using the road primarily built for his commute and causing traffic jams I am sure you would go much farther than that disciplined soul.
Now why allow civilians to move inside cantt, you can call that courtesy as there are several places where thorough fare has been stopped and your escapades onto cantt roads are short lived so enjoy while you can.

I am sure many members will agree that a defence personnel maintains his vehicles/cars in pristine conditions. One of my personal rides is an Indica which is 14 years to date and is about to touch 7 figures on odo, still has its original paint and all major components and I can vouch for the rides of my comrades too. Maintenance of an equipment is ingrained into our brains and We have to unlearn before we start misusing an equipment in this case rash driving.

Please get your facts right if I am on battle duty then my convoy gets precedence over every thing else on the road and if there is a parked car obstructing my way I have all the right to remove the obstacle as I deem fit

Your taxi driver friend is right that the guys would have refused to pay the PCB entry tax.. why should they pay to use their own road and most importantly that moronic taxi driver has not realised that they were saving his penny as the tax would have been borne by him, I would attribute this as a goodwill gesture on the part of the guys.

My request to the members is that please don't judge the entire force through a fine filter, we are also humans and mistakes do happen. I apologise to members who have truly experienced some unruly behaviour on the road from defence personnel but I am totally averse to people Contributing unnecessary generalised comments based on some trivia heard from a friend/uncle/mama/Chacha et al on this thread so please refrain.

[Hells Bells]

I come from a defence background and I can confidently state that a lot of defence folks are pretty unaware of how to drive in a typical "civilian" set up as they would have lived most of their lives in a cantt. Precautions such as wearing helmets is deemed to be necessary to get to CSDs as often cantts insist on both rider and pillion to wear helmets. The moment they are out of the zone, helmets are deemed unnecessary.

I equally agree that they deem it their birth right to not pay toll taxes and I often correct my father when he tries to do so (i.e. not paying toll) when he is travelling with me.

People may take offence of how can one portray defence folks in such vein and deem it "unpatriotic". I can't see the logic in the argument and for me, this is common civility & rule which is agnostic of one's background/profession. Paying taxes, following traffic rules, wearing right riding/driving gear - universal rules.

[Rahul Rao]

Originally Posted by alpha1

One taxi driver told me quite bluntly that if he is carrying defense personnel, the passenger themselves fight with the PCB fellows in order to NOT pay the entry tax. What kind of discipline are we talking about? Power hungry? Throwing the weight around at helpless private vendor collecting tax on PCB's behalf?

The tax is not applicable to vehicles carrying defence personel, or trucks carrying material on defense memo.
In the end cantonment roads belong to the army.
Only issue I find with defence vehicles is Pune is that they blatantly double park behind a civilian vehicle wrongly parked in 'reserved for defence slots' on MG road, and then argue with traffic police if they object, and even escalate matters with the military police.
The correct procedure should be to call a crane to tow away a vehicle parked in reserved for defence slots, and then park there.

Rahul

[TaureanBull]

Originally Posted by Rahul Rao

The tax is not applicable to vehicles carrying defence personel, or trucks carrying material on defense memo.
In the end cantonment roads belong to the army.
Only issue I find with defence vehicles is Pune is that they blatantly double park behind a civilian vehicle wrongly parked in 'reserved for defence slots' on MG road, and then argue with traffic police if they object, and even escalate matters with the military police.
The correct procedure should be to call a crane to tow away a vehicle parked in reserved for defence slots, and then park there.

Rahul

Even in this you find fault of defence personnels. Very strange.

It's again reiterated that defence personnels are exempt from toll taxes off/on duty. So anyone who is forcing their parents to pay can still do so to increase the government collection. Issue to ponder here whether that the civilians are wearing helmets when defence personnels are taking out outside the cantt? If it's not permitted then they can't take out. If it's permitted to be without helmet what's the fuss all about?
The driving sense of civilians is no better or worse than faujis.

[dheepak10]

Originally Posted by TaureanBull

I guess you are saying that they are floating rules when others are following the rules? These people are more undisciplined than the others? The Pune city civilians are following the rules and these defence personnel are flouting the rules. Don't make me laugh. I have driven enough in Pune or other cities. You are just expecting them to be disciplined than others as you think you are paying taxes. They would be as disciplined as others if not more.

I did have a laugh reading this. This is equivalent to saying that 'If I'm surrounded by Idiots, I may as well behave idiotically whenever I deem fit'.

In Cyberabad area of Hyderabad, I've never broken rules for the last 5 years I've been driving here, though I see many people doing so, including Policemen. If I had chosen to drive as I wish, just because I'm surrounded by others who don't follow rules, then I cannot expect others to still say that I'm a good, disciplined driver.

Hope

Originally Posted by RajeVenu

how many times have you seen a Defence vehicle in accident in your area or how many accidents you are aware of caused by defence vehicles.. I am sure it may not be nil but a miniscule amount compared to the chaos caused by other drivers.

Everyone needs to follow traffic rules - Period! "Miniscule" number of accidents are still a cause of concern. I'm not sure why you are taking this so personally. Bad apples always exist and need to be addressed; just because they are a few, they cannot be ignored completely. This is what brought us to the current situation that we are in - Bad road manners and sense amongst most people, No pedestrian signals, People running on the road, etc.

As you and another member has pointed out you regularly drive through cantt, may I ask if you are so concerned about the disobedience or flouting of traffic rules why don't you take an alternate route..

The second worst behaviour followed in India is - If something is not suiting you, then change yourself. In that case, everyone who has something to complain about bad traffic sense will have to just sit at home.

The third worst is that when someone has a concern or complaint, they actually don't take an action by making a complaint at the appropriate forum, but tend to discuss in public/private forums like TBHP and amongst friends. Request the aggrieved people to make a complaint at the appropriate forum, with pictures, if possible.