BANGALORE: Citizens were hoping for lesser traffic snarls on Friday morning, but two major traffic jams managed to disrupt the working schedules of many office goers, students and working professionals in Bangalore. Incarcerated mining baron and former Karnataka minister, G Janardhan Reddy brought the traffic to a complete halt at J C Road junction on Friday, leading to total chaos, for more than an hour. He was to be produced before the CBI court at 11 am and the resulting security measures as well as thronging crowds led to total disruption of traffic. Reddy’s appearance in the Bangalore court created total disorder as advocates clashed with media personnel. As a result, police had to resort to lathi charge. Subsequently, the drama brought the entire traffic to a standstill from J C Road up to the City Civil Court. It created problems for the office goers and school students.Mukund, a resident of Kumaraswamy Layout, said, “I was travelling from my residence to Queen’s Road when I got stuck up in the jam for more than half an hour at 10 am. The bus took a long time to cover a distance of just one km. I got delayed for reporting to work.” Voicing similar opinion was Aruna Sharma, an employee in an MNC said, “I was with my husband in our car and there was no way any vehicle could move. It became almost impossible for us to reach Minerva Circle. We were stuck for half an hour and the road was completely blocked. Finally, we managed to take the inner residential lanes in V V Puram and took a longer route to reach our work place.”“We drove through Kalasipalya and the crowded Avenue Road, and finally reached Mysore Bank junction. Moreover traffic coming from V V Puram to Town Hall was at a complete standstill and there was no way we could traverse this chock-a-block usual route,” she added.When City Express contacted Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) M A Saleem, he said, “There was a minor disruption in traffic due to a “situation of lawlessness” created by some lawyers near the court premises. However after 11.30 am, traffic was back to normalcy.”Adding to the woes of the suffering citizens, at the around the same time, commuters at the Mekhri Circle underpass also experienced traffic chaos for almost half an hour. For, Chief Minister D V Sadananda Gowda was on his way to Palace Grounds for the inaugural function of MSME Defence Expo. The traffic came to a halt as CM’s car had to take a U-turn from Mekhri Circle to reach his destination. Even vehicles coming from Bellary Road were made to cool their heels in the sweltering heat. However, the additional commissioner of Police (Traffic) claimed, “The traffic jam at Mekhri Circle was only for five minutes and definitely not more than that.” Now the question that lingers in everybody’s mind is: How long do the citizens of this city bear the brunt of VVIP movement that almost every time causes a major traffic jam; in a city that is already burdened with heavy traffic density?
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