Dip ye bloomin lights!

If you have driven at night in Bangalore you know what a pain it is. Even if don't drive in Bangalore you will know how much night traffic hurts. Your eyes that is.

In good old Bharat, we got half blackened headlights. Because a high-beam was painful and it was deemed best to cover the top half of the light in black paint so that everyone's eyes were spared.

But for whatever reason (if any of you know, please to write in) the dipped lights have gone! And what we are left with is a city-full of morons driving around in high-beam. And it hurts! Whether you are driving or sitting in the front or even sitting at the back, the glare emanating from all those high beams is painful. So much so that Subhash drives with his Oakley on at night. No kidding! Looking silly is way better than having a permanent eye damage, I agree.

So why do people drive on high beam in back to back traffic? Most of them probably think that unless you see that headlight symbol on in your dash, your headlight is not really on. Some bus-wallahs do it on purpose to get people out of their way (those bus-wallahs are a frustrated lot I tell ya, what else do you expect with all that driving day and night in mad city traffic). And I am guessing a majority of the rest just don't know that there are two forms of light in a vehicle. A low-beam for normal traffic/roads and a high beam for deserted ghat roads while going over a mountain.

So how can this mass be educated. I am not sure. I decided to start by posting it here. All those RJs who keep blabbering on and on during rush hour traffic can actually start to educate people on how to distinguish between these two lights and encourage people to drive on low-beam. I am sure if people drive on high-beam just because they are unaware, they will toe the line. I saw this very nice illustrative poster outside Secunderabad RTA (in Karkhana) which showed the difference between low-beam and high-beam and which one is the right one to use. (I am proud of Hyd man, did I already say that? :D) Sure, the Bangalore RTA guys can and should do something similar. But when was any damned Karanataka government agency so enterprising. I don't know, I never saw it in the whole course of my life, sigh!

So to start things off, here is a post. I am hoping my few readers will pass it on and spread the word, and save the pain to many a night driver.