Odd Kejriwal’s Not-So-Even Policy
-Prasad Kuberkar

The start of November saw the chief minister of Delhi, Arvind Kejriwal, suggest a policy to control the rapidly rising traffic and pollution in Delhi. He proposed a policy allowing only even numbered vehicles on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays, while odd numbered vehicles on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays, and Sundays. I believe that this policy will not work very well, with history and other factors on my side.

At the base, people in Delhi work at least for the weekdays, which is five days a week. Considering an employee has a car with an odd number plate, he will not be able to attend his office on three other days. This will be a disadvantage for him along with his employer. Overall, this will be of great inconvenience to employees, especially if they can’t afford another vehicle or if they don’t have any other public transport near homes. This will also reduce production of firms in Delhi.

In addition to this, another concern seems to arise. A significant amount of people in Delhi have enough money to afford another vehicle, if they don’t have the number plate of their choice. As a result, people are eventually going to buy more cars, so the traffic on the roads will not decrease too significantly.

The supporters of this policy may point out the direct advantage: there will be less private traffic on the roads. Less private traffic means lower overall traffic, leading to less time wasted in traffic and decreased accidents.

They also suggest that reduced traffic will result in much lesser pollution from vehicles. Also, people will now be motivated to carpool more often.

On the contrary, this policy may turn out to be a nightmare for the public transport officials. It will be extremely tough for the public transport to control such a sudden hike of people wanting to use their transport. Along with that, public transport itself emits huge amounts of carbon, especially the buses.

In conclusion, this policy is just a new born one for India and only time will tell if this will turn out to be a good move by the Delhi Government. It is noteworthy that the same policy has not worked exceptionally well in foreign countries.