Hyderabad: All traffic signals tur-ned red at 11 am for two minutes on Saturday, taking thousands of motorists by surprise. The two-minute silence was for Martyrs’ Day to mark the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi. The Centre had issued instructions to state governments to ensure that traffic is stopped for two minutes to pay homage.The Hyderabad traffic police used the occasion to test the traffic command control room at the police commissioner’s office at Basheerbagh.
“All signals were turned red at one go from the traffic command control room. This resulted in uniformity of signals. We monitored how the two-minute silence was observed from the control room. Everything went well. We can turn the signals green to clear the way for VVIPs whenever needed from control room,” traffic additional commissioner of police Jitender said.
At junctions without signals, traffic cops manually stopped the traffic. Several motorists argued with cops at the sudden stoppage. Few knew of Martyrs Day when this reporter asked them.When told of Martyrs Day, IT employee Rama Devi, who had stopped at the Patny crossroad in Secunderabad said: “It is a good decision by the government, but before implementing it, they should have created awareness.”
A few motorists were not convinced. Sunny, who refused to give his full name, said, “The two-minute traffic stoppage is unnecessary. We live in a democracy. The government should take the opinion of citizens before enforcing such rules. Everyone respects martyrs and there are better ways of showing respect for them.” “We were informed in the morning about the two-minute traffic stoppage,” said traffic cops Naresh Yadav, Ashok Reddy and B. Balachander at Patny junction.
