Ishan is infuriated by some of...

Ishan is infuriated by some of the recent policy decisions, and suggests that this government apathy actually points to a very grim reality.

In a recent freewheeling discussion with an ex-journo turned PR person, the subject of absurd government policies in our country featured prominently. He was lamenting – from a manufacturer’s point of view – the frivolousness and idiocy behind some of the policies in last year’s budget. And we all agreed with him. After all, which government in the world mandates that the length of a car ought to decide the tax bracket it falls under – or, for that matter, that ground clearance alone should determine whether a vehicle is an SUV or sedan.

Absurd and unnecessary regulations like these are appearing with increasing regularity across various aspects of our lives, but I think I should stick to speaking about cars. The overwhelming impression that I’m left with is that an ill-equipped bureaucracy is working on policy that it neither understands, nor has the technical capability to comprehend. As absurd as it is to tax vehicles based on length, it’s even more absurd to classify a vehicle as an SUV if it has more than 200mm of ground clearance – again, so that it can be taxed more.  Given the deplorable state of our roads, high ground clearance is not a luxury to be taxed, but a necessity in our driving conditions. Under this rule, cars like the Toyota Corolla Altis were classified as SUV’s – exposing our rule makers for the buffoons that they really are.

The funny thing is that, while the powers-that-be continue to think up such absurd rules, no one actually seems to be focusing on the real problems that affect us. For instance, the world over, cars are now taxed not according to their size or the fuel that they use, but according to their CO2 emissions – a verifiable fact for each car. Our government, instead, chooses to charge higher taxes on diesel vehicles because they know that the buying public prefers diesels – a situation they themselves have created with diesel subsidies. So, keep the fuel cheap with your subsidies, and then fleece the customer in every other way possible. Brilliant!

However, the most glaring issue that I see is the complete silence and lack of discussion when it comes to the safety aspect of our automobiles. Surprisingly, for a country which boasts of the highest number of fatalities in road accidents in the world – 1.43 lakh people died on our roads in 2011 – no one in the circles of power seems to be worried about this fact. Unlike developed countries, we have no provisions or regulations for crash testing of vehicles to test them for safety performance. Unlike the West, where each and every vehicle sold in the market has to be crash tested by law, no such laws exist in our country. Also, many countries have made the fitment of safety equipment, such as ABS and airbags, mandatory – but, once again, our government is completely silent on this matter.

Of course, if there were a crash testing policy and rating system in place, it would adversely affect some of our biggest domestic manufacturers. If you look at their product lineups, many have been selling cars in India that are more than 2 decades old and have no hope in hell of passing the latest worldwide standards of crash safety. So, obviously, there’s a strong lobby that discourages any such discussion in the corridors of power.

But I think in the larger picture is, in fact, the grimmest of the lot. The fact is that we’re a country of over 1.3 billion people – with millions dying every year of various causes. So what’s a few hundred thousand here or there who die on our roads annually? It’s just another statistic for the babus and netas of our country to shout nonsensically about. Let’s admit it, life is cheap and the government couldn’t be bothered if a few more perish on the roads.