If one sees a biker not wearing a helmet being stopped by none other than the mythological Narada at a round-about anywhere in Ranchi to teach him traffic rules and to request him to follow it, one doesn’t need to be surprised. This will continue for some days, because Narada has turned out to be the one of the last options for city traffic officials to bring some shame to increasing traffic rule offenders.
Disappointed after seeing all their humane efforts to teach traffic rule offenders a lesson going in vein, City traffic officials decided to take the help of something divine and grasped the feet of ‘son of God’. This is why Narada will be seen teaching traffic rules to offenders in various parts of Ranchi for some days from now. Interestingly, a Muslim man, Parvez Quraishi has accepted to wear the get-up of Narada and taken this assignment for saving lives of people.
“People do listen to their God. This is why we thought of launching a character which appears godly for educating and spreading awareness towards traffic rules and benefits of following it,” said Traffic SP Sanjay Ranjan Singh.
When asked why Narada only, Singh said, “Narada happens to be the first ever messenger in this universe. He always shows path ahead to all in distress. He keeps around roaming here and there at his will. This is why the very first reporter became our obvious choice to teach and educate offenders.” He added that this was also a reason of choosing a press reporter Quraishi as Narada.
But for Quraishi, it was one of his routine works. “I am an artist, who loves drama and has been in drama for long time. This is not the first time that I have worn the get-up of Narada. I have done it lots of times in different mythological based dramas apart from living characters of Eklavya and Arjuna among many others. I have directed critically acclaimed drama ‘Hadd Ho Gayi’ last year, which was based on eve-teasing,” said Quraishi.
Quraishi said that his religion (Islam) was nowhere in his mind while wearing attire of Narada, as art can’t be confined in religion. Quraishi was also comfortable with this get-up, because an NGO called apkanarad.com and its team including Ankur Sinha, Rahul Kumar, Dilip Kumar Sinha and Gautam Kumar were equally behind this entire practice of educating traffic offenders, which Quraishi is associated with from long time
According to Singh, this drive was a prologue of improving traffic of the city. “This is awareness drive. We will start being strict on offenders once this drive ends in a week or so. After that, a comprehensive drive of issuing challans and slapping penalties would start,” said Singh.
He said that the current Narada would be seen at different sites on weekdays for a week. On Sunday, 4-5 Naradas would be deployed at various sites. “We are going to schools. We have noticed that students are the one who avoid wearing helmet the most. We have spoken to a couple of Principals to request penalize the students of their school who don’t wear helmet. We are also in process to involve all stakeholders and inviting suggestions from all to improve traffic of the city,” said Singh.
And people are also listening to this new Narada on a round-about. “I have noticed that most of the people I spoke to were carrying helmets and not wearing it. Students appeared to be just careless, but with some shame, as they wore helmets after we counseled them,” said Quraishi.