“The Great Helmet Debate”- A No Brainer

By Sagar Sheldekar | December 12, 2009 | Columns, People | 1 comment

His voice was trembling as he recited what had just happened. He was scared beyond comprehension. He couldn’t stop blaming himself. He couldn’t stop crying for his friend who was now in the ICU fighting for his life. I tried my best to console him, to tell him that everything will be alright. That his friend will pull himself out of the coma, for the sake of his fiancé, his family and close friends. And as I uttered those words, I knew they were falling on deaf ears for he had seen his friend lying motionless on the road in a pool of blood.

After crashing into a speeding Matador, my friend and his colleague – the rider, had been flung in the air. While my friend escaped with a few bruises, his companion wasn’t as lucky. He landed on his head and cracked his skull. By the time the ambulance reached the accident spot, his head was bleeding profusely and was twice its normal size. It was obvious. It was going to take nothing less than a miracle, for him to survive.

So I cannot help but ask. Is this really what it takes? Do we really need to have a near death experience to finally see why motorists need to wear helmets? Reading about the ongoing debate in the dailies seems to suggest just that. The traffic conditions in Pune continue to deteriorate with every passing day and yet a majority of our motorists simply refuse to wear helmets. And then they go a step further and come up with these unbelievable reasons of why one should not wear a helmet.

One of the most common reasons people give for not wearing a helmet, is that it restricts their vision. Yes, helmets do restrict your peripheral vision to an extent but you can easily get around this problem by always keeping an eye on your Rear View Mirrors (RVM). It honestly doesn’t take a genius to figure that out. But considering RVMS are among the first “accessories” to be stripped off the bikes to make them look “cooler”, it’s understandable why many haven’t thought of this solution yet.

Then there’s the argument that helmets are really heavy and cause back and neck problems especially if you commute on bumpy roads. That probably could have been the case about ten to fifteen years ago. Today, if you are willing to invest a little more than what you would spend on the cheapest roadside helmet, there are plenty of options available which not only provide good protection but are also really light weight.

If you find full-face helmets claustrophobic, go for a faceless one. If you think helmets make you go bald, wear a bandana or a balaclava before you put it on. If you think they restrict your hearing ability, keep your visor open and you’ll be able to hear just fine. And I am not even going to try to counter what Mr. Sandip Khardekar has said because when you argue with a fool, you only make it that much more difficult for the viewers, (readers in this case) to pick out who the fool is.

Helmets save lives. Period! That’s a fact and there’s no denying it. I agree that it does take a while to get used to wearing a helmet in heavy traffic and people have met with accidents during this transition phase. Yet, if you weigh these instances with the number of lives that have been saved because of helmets, they fade in comparison.

In the end, it’s your life. You can either be a responsible rider and wear a helmet or test your fate till the day your luck runs out. The choice is yours!

More articles by Sagar Sheldekar

• Restaurant review- Asian Melange - January 8th, 2010
• New Year Blues - December 19th, 2009
• Malshej Waterfall 1200' Rappelling Camp (October 39th Week 2009) - October 15th, 2009
• MindSpark - CoEP's Tech-Fest (October 38th Week 2009) - October 8th, 2009
• Agro- Tourism Project at Solshi - October 7th, 2009