Driving in India

It took me a while to get used to it! The constant honking, the squeezing into non-existent lanes, reversing in the middle of the road, driving in the wrong lane... There are traffic rules, if broken in any of the other countries I've been to, could cost you a whole lot of money as a fine, or even a night in jail and your license revoked! But they seem pretty minor issues over here...It's much worse out of Delhi (I live on the outskirts of Delhi) and worse with the Auto Rickshaws! I soon realized trying to get the rickshaw drivers to follow rules made them more nervous and increased chances of an accident happening so I hold my breath and let them do their thing.. best way to handle it, trust me.

I have lived in a big city (Hyderabad, India) and also lived in a small town. People rarely care about traffic rules. I feel like slapping on roads. Drivers are at their worst. Even the educated people and people who work at big multi national companies have the same behavior. It's just in their blood to drive so.No one teaches in India how to drive patiently. not in school, not in driving schools and no where.

If there is something I totally hate in India, that will be the driving style of Indians.

I drive in India. I also have an Indian license. Which cost 6 times as much as it should have done, but I didn't have a choice. It was either that or no licence.

Driving here on the whole is OK. You need to be an aggressive driver which fortunately I am. There is no sitting waiting to be let out into the traffic. There are no give ways or stops. So you need eyes everywhere.

Indian drivers have no concern or safety. it goes through me when I see children not strapped in. Never mind the adults who should know better. 3/4/5 even 6 on a bike. Super scary.

Slow drivers until they reach queuing traffic and then they become impatient, honking a horn and creating 2/4/5 extra lanes, theoretically blocking the road. So no one can get through. No common sense.

Driving in the fastlane of the highway doing just 30kms. Never mind vehicles travelling the wrong way.

All good fun.

It depends which city in India you are driving but generally I think the drivers and especially the auto rickshaw drivers are some of the best in the world..
I would say the driving is organized chaos.. skillful and effective driving.. I have seen very few accidents in the cities..
I think drivers from other countries can learn a lot from the Indian drivers...

The vast majority of Indian drivers are poorly trained, but how bad the situation is varies a lot from place to place. I recently moved from a village in the Tirthan Valley area of Himachal Pradesh to Shimla and I was shocked at the difference in the way people drive in the two areas. In Tirthan Valley, the drivers are mostly quite careful, not so many driving way too fast. Shimla drivers, on the other hand, like to drive as fast as possible, and they don't do it very well.

But what I've noticed most about Indian men when they get behind the wheel anywhere is that no matter how patient they might be under other circumstances, most tend to get really impatient while driving. They just can't bear to wait a second for someone to get out of their way. It's certainly like that in Delhi, anyway.

When in India, learn driving from the Auto-rickshaws!
Nothing, I repeat..Nothing is a barrier for them. They are like the Visiting Faculty in the driving department. They come and they go, you can't do anything about it, no room for complaints either. I personally have always felt that auto-drivers here take driving to be a power-display exercise (and by extension, most other Indian drivers as well).

One thing that people hardly mention, comes across as a problematic issue for me, the narrow streets being clogged with parked cars (or to be more precise, haphazardly parked cars), not only at night, anytime, anywhere. And more often than not, it is not likely that you are going to find the driver/car-owner in the vicinity. They would have gone on a different trip altogether (if you get my drift ). Really annoying.

On the whole, it is not that difficult to get used to, except for a quirk which I, being born and brought up here, and engaging in the exercise of driving in a number of Indian cities (that is to say inspite of spending a hell lot of energy behind the wheel in a highly divergent driving space-time in India), haven't been able to comprehend (or accept for that matter)- the "honking".
Note: There is absolutely NO need for light-indicators in your car, or rear-view mirrors, even a deflated tyre is acceptable, but if your car is not equipped with a really shrill horn, it is not drive-able on Indian roads.