About the Origin of the Movement

The Movement is a brainchild of Rajendra Sidhaye.  The web site design has been done by Anant Gokhale and his team at Crystaline Infotek. All content in this site, (except of course the messages from others), is by Rajendra Sidhaye.

Following is an interesting story about the birth of this movement narrated by him :
In June, 1998 I had penned a sarcastic Marathi poem on Pune traffic : "Vahatuk Punyachi". I had an opportunity to present it at different places and gatherings, including one at Tilak Smarak Mandir. The poem was appreciated and enjoyed by many, I even received "Once more" which pleases any poet!    (If you want to read the poem, click here)

However, I started having an uneasy feeling later, when it dawned upon me that the people only have fun, not even one person seems to express "I realize I am also contributing to this mess. We need to do something". That slowly gave a realization that although we keep cribbing citing various reasons, like lack of proper roads, signals, lack of seriousness from Police, Corporation, RTO and everybody else, main reason seems to be that, nobody owns up the responsibility for his/her own contribution to the mess. I asked many people, even Police on the road about their opinion about the source of the problem and their answers confirmed this realization.

While thinking about it, another thing struck me is that a very large percentage of the society is made of responsible and conscious citizen, who will not commit any crime, even in a dream. However, as far as the traffic rules are concerned, this large mass of responsible citizen is getting carried away with few hardcore irresponsible elements, and secondly everybody is just dependant on some magic action by some other entity. Sad thing to note was that, more and more of the conscious people have started rationalizing their irresponsible behavior on the road.

Hence, I started thinking, how can this vicious circle be broken? How can the responsible citizen be united and networked, so that the transformation can be driven by us?? That gave birth to the idea, 'What if everybody says and commits, "I follow rules, no matter anything else" '? That gave rise to the idea of the message sticker on a vehicle declaring this. I thought that this message sticker can be a powerful networking link, connecting the responsible citizen, who can boldly voice their intention.

Based on this theme, I wrote an article, and also a poem, this time directly hitting and appealing the conscience, in Feb, 2000. Quite a few people with whom I shared it, for few months, liked the idea but were sceptical. But the more I thought about it, more I got convinced. So, I thought let me break out of this circle and take opinion of some eminent personalities of Pune. First one I could get time with, was Dr. Vasant Gowarikar, whom I met on 16th September, 2000. He gave a patient hearing to my presentation of the idea, and was all praise for it, saying "I congratulate you for having thought like this, then having written this, and then wanting to spread this into a movement. Do Not Stop, please go ahead". That was a great moment and a great moral booster. He also suggested that, before publishing the material, it'd be good if it is started in a small way. I also met Prof. Shivajirao Bhosale and he also gave encouraging words. I am deeply indebted to both Dr. Gowarikar and Prof. Shivajirao Bhosale for the encouragement.

Then, again I started interacting with people with the idea of spreading the movement, but still was not progressing much in terms of acceptability and couple of more months passed. Finally I decided, if nobody is taking me very seriously, let me start from myself first. Hence, I went ahead and put a message sticker on my car, on 15th December, 2000. It required a lot of internal fight in my mind, as to what the world will say and mockery that I will have to face. However I finally thought, "Will you ever be able to pardon yourself, if this idea just dies out in your own mind, so what if two great people praised the idea".

This start from myself, was a turning point for the movement. There must have been some ridicule, some mockery behind my back, from close people also. But once having dived in, there was no turning back! First few days I was unsure. But then, I saw that it does make an impact, though may be temporary. Sweet surprises were, when few unknown people stopped me from time to time, asked about the message on the car, and when I told them the idea just briefly in 5 minutes, expressed support, saying they will join the movement. This kept adding to confidence. Mr. Mukund Awati of Display Creators / Raviraj Publicity helped me with the message sticker, and in the process himself got charged up with the idea. I am indebted to him also for the support regarding the stickers.

At the end of December, I also got the idea of making a website and using Internet as a vehicle for spreading the movement. Mr. Anant Gokhale and his team at Crystalline Infotek, helped me a lot with the web site design and complete face uplift for the site. I am deeply indebted to them for the support.

In Feb, 2001 I met Dr. Vijay Bhatkar, and he also praised the idea and was always a great source of encouragement. He even consented to come from his busy schedule for the inauguration of the movement, which took place at a small function on 18th March,2001. I am extremely grateful to Mr.Bhatkar for his support.

I also want to express my gratitude towards all the friends, relatives, the eminent Puneites who blessed the movement, as well as so many people on roads who have joined and those who communicated via email on Internet and expressed support for the movement.

Though the movement has taken some shape, still this is only a beginning. We have a long long way to go. Please join in and help spread the movement. Remember that circulation letter or mail, saying that "if you forward it to 10 people, it will bring you luck"? I dont know anybody who ever benifitted by forwarding such a letter. However, spreading this movement faster through all possible channels can surely make us overcome this demon of traffic mess. Together we win!

Thank you,

Rajendra Sidhaye