Chennai Traffic-Beware of the Blue light

Can you identify the light on the left? Doctors warn about it. Police warn about it. Newspapers warn about it. But all the warnings fall on deaf ears.

Got it now? It is the blue light normally seen on any dash board;bike or car. Do you know what it means? If yes, why do you have it on? If no, why are you on the road in the first place?

I don't know whether it is the characteristic of any police announcement anywhere in the world or just confined to India that announcement is made for announcement sake! Start from never ending warnings to Autos, helmet flip flop, dedicated website, pavement for pedestrians, Thirupathy chalo traffic diversion, turnable no 'U' turns, oh! come on you know what I am talking about. But there was one announcement which hit the headlines, then the 3rd page and sometimes the obituary page that was given through press conference;newspapers quoted eye surgeons and foolish people like me were happy!

I hope you know now what I am talking about! Not as popular as rash driving, helmet less travel, jumping signals;but nevertheless as dangerous.

High Beam - a bright light that dims many a lives and families. Many a times I had wondered about the need of High beam in our city traffic. Yes, there are many unlit streets, roads and sometimes useful in spotting the pot holes. But are these the only reasons or is there some other reason for switching on the high beam?

Suddenly it hit me. Not the bright light normally but I think I got it right. See, we are so used to on/off positions in switches normally. But in this case we have three positions;off/low beam/high beam! Maybe this is what confuses many drivers/riders. They think that the switch at mid point means faulty switch! So go all the way up - literally for their switch and sometimes for.... Then what about the blue light. It is there to tell you that the high beam is on, have mercy, beam it low. But people take it as an indication that the head light is on!

Sometimes I wonder whether the people know that there are two beam settings. Till I get an answer for that PLEASE BE AWARE OF THE LIGHT!