On the way to Agra

We left Jaipur at 8am since it's quite a long way to Agra and also a good thing to exit the city before the mass traffic starts. It was raining so was an even better thing to do!

After exiting the usual hassle an unrelenting horns of the city The way was clear and we drove easily on the good highway joining the two cities until we saw a van coming high speed wrong way. Well for us it's something to worry about but now we got used to it that in India this can happen quite normally so we just took it with a pinch of salt until the second and third car came by wrong way making signs to turn around as the road was closed! Thinking there was an accident on the road our driver turned the car and we drove back (wrong way as there was no other way) and followed the other cars which had already turned on the opposite side of the road thus going towards Agra on the wrong way lane against traffic. After a minute of driving we saw a large amount of trucks parked on both sides and we kept on driving until other tourist drivers waved our driver to stop. Our driver went to investigate what had happened and on coming back we learnt that it was a protest. People were sitting on the road closing traffic! The shocking thing was that this was not for any political reason or national aspect but it was locals getting themselves heard! A small girl from the village 4 or 5 years old had been run over by a truck and the truck driver kept on driving. So the people managed to stop a truck from the same company so that something is done. In the process they closed a main traffic artery and surely caused some disruption in the transport system.

Well honestly they caused a bit of disruption in our plans but we tried to take it calmly. We spoke to some kids who were off to school and with other fellow travellers and all was fine until the older kids of the village started to break bits from the road railings just for fun and hassling mainly the tourists! It wasn't fun and this lasted for 4 hours until finally some negotiation ( not from police as they were simply standing there and not acting on it ) moved the blockade and we were free to proceed on our way.

Well I am not qualified to comment much on this situation only that I can understand the protest and the objective but cannot tolerate that in these situations people who just don't have anything use these situations to just destroy stuff like these kids were doing! It's a shame even-more when I think of the many bad roads I have seen here in India and then a new road like this is being vandalised by idiots. On the other hand I hope that the protest worked and that justice was made.




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