Ho Jao Left Ambulance First

Somebody called RJ Rubina at Fever 104 Bangalore with tragic story of losing his father as they fell short of just five minutes before reaching hospital. Reason? Ambulance getting stuck in bloody traffic.

This prompted Fever 104 Bangalore to start an awareness campaign to save patients from losing their life so cheaply. “Ho Jao Left Ambulance First”, I am sure you all must be hearing this message many times a day. I am also quite a believer in the fact that you already must be following this to save the lives.

However while we do tend to give importance to such things we also seem to be conveniently ignoring such messages specially during festive celebrations and processions. After all life is so cheap in India. Isn’t it?

Yes, its time to please our own, one of the most worshipped God in India, Ganesha who also is called Vigneshwara. Vigneshwara means Lord of all obstacles, who is looked upon to clear all the obstacles from our lives. Do you think he would be pleased to see himself as an obstacle (Vigna) on the road in front of somebody who is in dire need of reaching to wherever he wants to reach, may be to see his loved once, to airport, to railway station, to bus station or most important of all to the hospital battling for life? The patient in ambulance might have an hour if he is lucky or few crucial deciding minutes that could change the fortune of the patient and his whole family for rest of the life. So dear devotees of Lord Ganesha make it a point to not to spoil his name and make all the conscious efforts to give way to the one who is in need specially ambulance.

Now lets talk about non-festive regular killer traffic. I have observed many times people are quite sensible and do try to give a way but then at times traffic is such that the helpless drivers stuck in front of ambulance themselves don’t have literally inches to move. On the top of it, at time ambulance get stuck so far behind in the traffic that even traffic cop isn’t quite aware of the situation. In such a situations the role of two wheeler driver or pillion rider becomes very important. Pillion rider can get down or two wheeler driver can park the vehicle towards the left side of the road and run towards signal to inform traffic cop about the situation.  Let me tell you it works, if you don’t believe try it out by yourself. I have done it myself when an ambulance was stuck in a traffic at signal. While I brought the situation to traffic cop’s attention by literally running to the signal at first signal, at the very next signal I again started running but to my surprise somebody else who was ahead of me took charge and got the traffic cleared. It was so satisfying to see that good things still are contiguous to many people in our modern society. Word of caution, please do take care of yourself while you take charge to save life of a patient in ambulance.

We don’t really need any more fatalities and hence lets take a vow to do whatever it takes to help patient to reach hospital during that golden hour or within time. Life is precious, lets save it.

 Mahesh Gidwani

Founder and CEO, drivekool