I have a strange relationship with auto-rikshaws. Since childhood, I am constantly bumping on Autos everywhere I found them!
When I was 14, my dad brought me a new lavendar miss India cycle. With all joy and confidence I was ready to take her home! So, I was on my new cycle, mom and dad on scooter (yeah my favorite hamara bajaj), we reached near home. Much busy admiring my "miss india", I failed to notice the auto coming from opposite side and the next minute I was below auto. That was a first clash (Of course for my cycle. For me it might me 100th or 200th perhaps), gave a broken front basket and a bent in front-wheel.
My cycle's first ride took her to garage instead of home!
After a month when I was going to school on cycle, I fell in love with another auto and did a fantastic dhoom stunt on a narrow road. This resulted in 1 week of leave due to scratched right leg from knee to toe. But by then it was routine for my teachers since 1 week of leave was still manageable compared to 1 month leave of previous year and 40 days for the year before that! Thanks to my self destructive habits.
It was a saree day during second year and my friend came to pick me up for college. She was on scooty and I insisted to drive. We reached main road, constantly chattering, going parallel with one Auto. Suddenly the autowala realized that he should be driving from left side of the road and without looking anywhere he turned left! I lost my balance, as a reflex action turned right and did ride scooty on a traffic police who was just standing there. All three of us were lying on ground and scooty went ahead to crash upon a wall. My friend got scared and I was still trying to figure out what happened exactly. However, police uncle are not bad all the time. Considering our "Decent" faces and saarees, instead of asking for fine, he gave us a polite smile and asked if we needed any help ;)
After coming to Pune as well, there was no change in this relationship. In-fact this time it created better impact. During my initial days in Pune, my company bus crashed an auto once in Kothrud.
Later on when I brought a new streak, went to Laxmi Road with my bro sitting behind me. (Now don't ask me how Puneits can manage to drive on a place like Laxmi road as when you stay in Pune, you get all the answers.) So we were going through a crowd and an autowala came from (god only knows from which) galli and tried to overtake us. But a Maruti 800 blocked both of us and while trying to apply breaks to my streak, my bro was inside the Auto! (I wish if there was any cute girl in auto, my bro might have taken a chance over there. but there was one Aunty sitting, so I had to take all the blaim on me)
The reason I remembered all this today is (yeah you guessed it right), it was my "fall for Rickshaw" day today! While coming to office in the morning, I helped a garagewala to earn a few bucks by breaking that Auto's headlight.
Now what could be the possible reasons that I choose only Autos to collide? Hmm I got them...
1. Their wierd shape : I don't get judgement of Auto's triangular shape while driving!
2. Autowalas rarely use side mirrors while turning left or right... and have you ever noticed any autowala giving you a signal that it's gonna take a turn?
3. Some autos always keep right even on heavy traffic roads. I wonder why dont they consider a maximum speed an Indian auto can have is 45-50 km/hr?
Interesting! let me know if you find any other reasons and also if there are any suggestions to avoid collisions with autos!
