A man’s mission to make Gurugram’s roads safer

Every morning, for two to three hours, Baweja dons a fluorescent jacket and takes his post at major intersections, helping regulate traffic alongside police officers.

For more than a decade, 55-year-old Jagdish Baweja has stood at the edge of Gurugram’s snarled crossroads, guiding traffic and saving lives -- not as a policeman, but as a volunteer. He is one of the city’s longest-serving “road safety officers,” a role he took in 2011after losing a close family member in a road accident 15 years ago. That tragedy, he says, altered the course of his life forever.

Jagdish Baweja (Parveen Kumar/HT)

Every morning, for two to three hours, Baweja dons a fluorescent jacket and takes his post at major intersections, helping regulate traffic alongside police officers. When not on the road, he holds awareness drives at schools, colleges, corporate offices, and trucking hubs -- educating people about road safety, emergency response, and traffic rules. “If even one life is saved, the effort is worth it,” he said.

He began alone, but today, 81 volunteers work with him under the banner of the Road Safety Organisation, originally founded by fellow volunteer Neeraj Dewan.

Over the years, Baweja, a real estate businessman, has poured much of his personal income into this mission. “I purchased cameras, tripods and other equipment to install them at several accident-prone locations for shooting hours-long videos and showed them to authorities for making necessary changes in the road design or taking safety steps to save lives,” he said.

With winter approaching and visibility set to drop, Baweja and his group have launched their annual drive to stick high-quality reflective tapes at key points along the Delhi-Jaipur Expressway. “We started on Monday and have already covered all the entry points. By next week, we will cover all the exit points too. I had not taken a single penny from any government agency for this drive too. I and other volunteers are bearing the expenses of these high-quality tapes as like other drives,” he said.

But Baweja’s journey began with a moment of instinctive call for duty.

One morning, 14 years ago, he was driving to his Sadar Bazar office when he saw an ambulance trapped in a traffic jam, its siren wailing. “I was already in pain due to the loss of a close one in a road accident that time and could not bear that scene of that trapped ambulance,” he recalled.

He approached a zonal officer, who asked him to help operate the traffic signal. “A constable guided me on which switches to press. Within seconds, the light turned green, the ambulance moved, and the road cleared,” he said. Baweja said he felt a palpable sense of calm.

The constable told him about the traffic volunteer programme. Baweja filled out a form, was inducted as a road safety officer, and has been at it ever since. “From that day, I decided that every hour I can spare will go to saving lives,” he said.

Initially, his family was far from supportive. “My wife and children questioned why I was spending money to do work meant for the police. They said -- there’s government funding for this, why you?” he recalled. But over time, seeing the lives he helped save changed their minds.

“I’ve often rushed victims of accidents to hospitals and waited until their families arrived. Once my children saw that, their doubt turned into pride. Now both my son and daughter contribute financially to support my work,” he said.

Today, Baweja is regarded with deep respect by the city’s traffic police. Inspector Sandeep Kumar, who heads the Gurugram traffic volunteer coordination, called him “our most senior and dedicated volunteer.” “He’s been with us continuously for 15 years. His motivation never fades -- he’s selfless, disciplined, and always on the ground,” Kumar said.