[Ram]

The Mumbai Pune expressway has five tunnels totalling over 5.7 km. built by the Konkan Railway Corp. Ltd.

However, the Bhatan tunnel alone has a notice posted which bans photography and videography.

Any idea why?

Ram

Postscript: pic above found on net. not taken by me.

[Vid6639]

Camera flash may be blinding inside a tunnel. Just a wild guess. I think I remember a few places on the expressway as no flash zones.

[moralfibre]

Ram, is Bhatan the longest tunnel on the expressway stretch?

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by ram

The Mumbai Pune expressway has five tunnels totalling over 5.7 km. built by the Konkan Railway Corp. Ltd.

However, the Bhatan tunnel alone has a notice posted which bans photography and videography.

Any idea why?




Ram

Postscript: pic above found on net. not taken by me.

India still has the Official Secrets Act which restricts photography in strategic sites - airport, tunnels, bridges, etc - so that the Pakistanis and Americans do not know how (a) they were built, since they employ complex sophisticated technologies, and (b) they can be attacked during hostilities, since the planes will not know what to bomb!!!

Originally Posted by moralfibre

Ram, is Bhatan the longest tunnel on the expressway stretch?

Bhatan Tunnel is the longest - almost 2 kms long. Madap (same stretch, Panvel-Khopoli), Kamshet 1 and Kamshet 2 (Lonavla-Dehu Road) are the others.

[BaCkSeAtDrIVeR]

Official secrets Act?? My foot!!! Bah!!!
Look at what used happen in Cochin port area in the early 1980s.
The Indian Navy's Cochin base was yet in its infancy, the shipyard, the Thevara bridge, etc, were off bounds for cameras, and there used to be signs on the bridge (the naval base and shipyard are just on the side of the Thevara bridge) every few meters that photography on the bridge is prohibited.
As a part of my family business, I used to commute over this bridge 10 (ten) times a day, for several years.
And frequently, there were tourists, on hired boats, in the water, photographing the bottom of the bridge, all that can be photographed from water fo the shipyard, and the naval base.
Photographing the mattancherry / Ernakulam wharf of the cochin port trust was even more easier. The tourists never had to hire a boat even. They simply paid the princely sum of 25 or 50 paise and took a ferry, occupied a convenient seat on the left side of the boat (how did they know that the port comes up on your left side?) and happily took VIDEOS.
Those were the first time I saw a video camera.
Modern handycams from sony are huge behemoths when compared to what those tourists carried.
Where they mere tourists?
I never know.
But I now know one thing - having white skin and blond hair means that your sneeze will blow away the Official Secrets Act.

[Nitin]

I wonder if the other aspect is to avoid any sort of distraction while driving through the tunnel. A small flash could gather a person's attention,and if he takes his eyes off the road,there's every chance he'll end up ramming into the wall of the tunnel at about 100kmph (if there's a speed limit,then it ought to be somewhere lower).

The idea of keeping the structure hidden in terms of being a target - i really dont think so. There are way more number of targets that terrorists/militants could focus on.

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by Nitin

I wonder if the other aspect is to avoid any sort of distraction while driving through the tunnel. A small flash could gather a person's attention,and if he takes his eyes off the road,there's every chance he'll end up ramming into the wall of the tunnel at about 100kmph (if there's a speed limit,then it ought to be somewhere lower).

The idea of keeping the structure hidden in terms of being a target - i really dont think so. There are way more number of targets that terrorists/militants could focus on.

You will have to tell that to Indian lawmakers!

Here is a description of the Act - it is only 84 years old!

The Official Secrets Act 1923 is India's anti-espionage act held over from British colonisation. It states clearly that any action which involves helping an enemy state against India. It also states that one cannot approach, inspect, or even pass over a prohibited government site or area. According to this Act, helping the enemy state can be in the form of communicating a sketch, plan, model of an official secret, or of official codes or passwords, to the enemy. The disclosure of any information that is likely to affect the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the State, or friendly relations with foreign States, is punishable by this Act.

The Act obviously has not heard of thinks like digital photography and satellite imagery!

(7) "photograph" includes an undeveloped film or plate;

And here is the Official Secret!

any railway, road way or channel, or other means of communication by land or water (including any works or structures being part thereof or connected therewith) or any place used for gas, water or electricity works or other works for purposes of a public character, or any place where any munitions of war or any sketches, models, plans or documents relating thereto, are being made, repaired, or stored otherwise than on behalf of Government, which is for the time being declared by the Central Government, by notification in Official Gazette, to be a prohibited place for the purposes of this Act on the ground that information with respect thereto, or the destruction or obstruction thereof, or interference therewith, would be useful to an enemy, and to which a copy of the notification in respect thereof has been affixed in English and in the vernacular of the locality;

[Nitin]

Ah.. 1923 rules & regulations..
Interesting!

[gd1418]

Probably because a secret underground approach exists to BARC all the way from somewhere in between the tunnel area to take out enriched uranium and then transport it all the way to Pokharan so that the hight tech spy satellites of US of the A would not detect.....Outrageous; don't you think so? So do I, but that is the only probable explanation I could think of.

I don't think I'm serious..:-)

Originally Posted by ram

The Mumbai Pune expressway has five tunnels totalling over 5.7 km. built by the Konkan Railway Corp. Ltd.

However, the Bhatan tunnel alone has a notice posted which bans photography and videography.

Any idea why


Ram

Postscript: pic above found on net. not taken by me.