Is Your Car Really Your Status Symbol? 
Is Your Car Really Your Status Symbol?
Posted by: Nimesh Sharma in Ideas on Aug 05, 2010
So, you bought a car (or your second car recently) – your status symbol and got it out on road and lo behold - there are traffic snarls everywhere. Wherever you drive, it is taking so long to reach. Where do you drive now?
Think again! Is your car really your status symbol? If you still think yes, would you hold the same opinion in next few years? Would our traffic systems, road & flyover construction & maintenance departments, car manufacturers and others let you hold the same opinion then? At least in metros? Wouldn't you want to use some other means of conveyance which eases traffic congestion, is eco-friendly and takes less time, (though you may have to sacrifice on some other comfort).
In some of the advanced countries, they have all citizens cycling their way to office on atleast one day in a week or a month. Why cant we do the same thing? We even have great vehicle called cycle rickshaw which is totally eco-friendly, but none of us use it proudly, the sole issue being 'status symbol'. “What will my colleague/ neighbor/friend/ relative think if I dont have a car or use a two wheeler or bicycle to office?, which I aptly reiterate in Hindi as “Sabse Bada rog, Kya kahenge log?”
It needs some broad -minded thinking on our part to do the same. And we do have some intellectuals who wont think just about their status symbol but about status of roads, environment, natural resources and their next generation also?
Delhi based noted media person, activist and columnist Sadia Dehlvi purchased a rickshaw as a second vehicle after Zen. In her own words, “It’s vulgar driving huge fancy cars in a crowded city like ours and rather cumbersome to have a fleet in colonies with parking problems.”
Check out her story - 'Delhi's rickshaw walli' on http://www.thedelhiwalla.com/2008/04/17/around-town-sadia-dehlvi-the-rickshaw-walli/
You wont think about Rickshaw the same way, but may be as a family vehicle. :-) Besides, there's no dearth of designers to transform the commercial looking rickshaw into a coveted status symbol.
Check out the possibilities of designer rickshaws : http://bit.ly/apyvDx
And, a startup on this proves the viability of the concept: http://www.fremo.in/HowItWorks.aspx
Check this out...
If our youth in DU, North Campus can promote rickshaws, and DMRC can promote cycle culture, I guess others can follow from there and alter our definitions of “status symbol”. If not immediately, then may be in few months or years.
Also read:
Solar-electric rickshaws anyone?
Platform for aesthetically pleasing and eco-friendly products
Delhi's rickshaw wallahs eye up the e-rick (BBC)
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written by Shailesh, August 24, 2010
While I too am a believer of eco-friendly living. I think you are way off-mark.
For one, India being a tropical country and highly populous, if someone were to cycle all the way, where average office-home distance is measured as 12~15 kms, they would be drenched in sweat. Imagine get into work sweaty and smelly! Even the thought is a put off.
Secondly what's the point, when one is most likely to sit in an air conditioned office, whose contribution to pollution is almost equal if not more than what a car can spew out.
Cycling, is feasible in Amsterdam and other cooler places, for one, you do not sweat, and two the population on the road, is not too much of a bother. Don't simply try to cut and copy practices from west and replicate here. They simply will not work.
Start thinking!! (of innovative ideas, not cut and paste solutions)
silly bandz
power balance