Spellcheck
The public buses in Goa are mandatorily required to display painted signs in buses to indicate the seats reserved for “Physically handicapped”, “Senior citizens” and “Ladies only” as also the “No. of standing passengers allowed” and “No smoking” signs. It has, however, been observed that there are spelling errors in such signs of many buses. e.g. the word “handicapped” is spelled as “handy cap”, and “handycapped”. Likewise, the word “Senior” is spelled as “senyor” while the word “Citizens” is spelled as “Cityzens” or “Cityzins”. Similarly, the word “Ladies” is spelled as “Ladis”, but the icing on the cake of such atrocious spelling is for “No Smoking” which reads as “Nosmo King”. Such ludicrous spellings cause confusion in the impressionable minds of t commuting school-going children. The Road Transport Department should, therefore, issue a circular to all the bus owners indicating the correct spelling of these signs with a view to rectifying such outlandish errors.
Rosario S. Fernandes, Arossim
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‘Holier than thou’
The Aam Admi Party (AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal has reportedly done away with the escort or Personal Security Officer (PSO) that he is entitled to and has also decided not to live in the official government bungalow but has said that he would be living in a flat. Is this just a form of tokenism or symbolism that the AAP is indulging in? Instead of doing away with security cover, what is more important is that that the citizens of the state, especially the women, are able to feel secure while walking on the streets of Delhi. Ministers not taking up their official residence is nothing new. Many politicians in power are living in their ancestral homes. Several politicians are practicing austerity in their everyday life, including our very own Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar. What is important is for the AAP government to pursue issues that really affect the common man and stop projecting that the party is a ‘holier than thou’ entity. It should do away with tokenism and symbolism and get on with the task at hand.
Adelmo Fernandes, Vasco
Traffic hazards
This is with reference to the article on traffic chaos in Goa. There is surely a disaster waiting to happen as all the law enforcement authorities are busy standing near speedbreakers, fining people for not wearing helmets and other petty offences, while they should be in the middle of the highway stretches, penalizing people for overtaking and speeding. Goa is the only place where you are not fined for stopping your vehicle on a major bridge and taking pictures, driving slowly on a fast lane and taking a turn on a major highway to the right and remaining on the right before entering the highway. The traffic signals are a joke, standing still, unmaintained and unused. Traffic management in Goa has little priority with badly erected speedbreakers and a stress on how to implement helmet wearing for pillion riders. Right now we cannot even cross on foot the Porvorim stretch of the highway or join highway traffic from any lane. Please focus on the core problems relating to traffic in Goa.
Mark Fernandes, Porvorim
Lack of patrolling
When politicians dictate the posting of their favourite police officers, there is every likelihood the officers will not care too much about their own efficiency. The spate of robberies taking place proves once again that the police have no strategy to patrol the entire State. Forget about day patrolling, how many times do senior officers go out for night patrolling? During my visit to Goa in September while travelling from Canacona to the airport at Dabolim, I was surprised to find just one police naka bandi at Balli junction and not a single cop from there on.
The recent robbery and murder of a senior citizen should be a wake up call to our senior police officials. The DGP, IGP and higher ranking officers should make periodic checks to find out the shortcomings of our police patrolling. There should be at least an armed police naka bandi at every strategic junction.
Julius Carvalho, Dubai-UAE
Impartial system
It is said that rules must be obeyed. You have to play by the rules. So, in the case of standard procedures being followed by those seeking to acquire full-fledged Portuguese nationality or citizenship, it is my plea to the Ministry of Home Affairs to reconsider, for the Election Commission of India to verify thoroughly, the Delhi High Court to be impartial and the Supreme Court to uphold the rights of those who obey the rules and the therefore the law, so as to be the conscience of the law. Violators should be chastised. But the authorities should reinforce the fact that those who abide by the fundamental principles be held not guilty.
Elvidio Miranda, Panjim
Justice for all
The time has come to make parents abettors for the rash driving of their wards, solely for the reason that they are flaunting their wealth by gifting unlimited use of two and four wheelers to their wards. Let us take a breakdown of the 4057 road accidents reported as on 16/12/2013 by the RTO of which 225 are fatal and 242 causing eventual death. In the day accidents the main causes are rash driving and badly maintained roads and in night accidents the main causes are drunken driving, driving with powerful headlights and potholed, badly maintained roads.
Poorly maintained roads is the common factor in both day and night categories of road accidents. It should logically follow that the Honourable PWD minister should be made an abettor to this category of accidents as also the minister of transport for not deploying effectively highway patrols to monitor the judicious movement of vehicles. These ministers should also be fined and chargesheeted along with the parents.
Glocerio Fernandes, Velim
