THE sheer gore of it -- in the open street -- has been mind-boggling beyond measure. But this is not the first time it has happened. Only six months ago, a physician was dragged to death, his feet having been ensnared in the extra bumper of a car. This time, Nahar Begum (25), a garment worker on her way to work is first knocked down by a Pajero utility van and then her sari is tangled with the back wheel cover.

Lethally, she is dragged to her death as a pedestrian chase by a crowd joined by a traffic policeman to holler at the driver to stop proved in vain. On other similar occasions, no amount of public hue and cry could persuade the driver to screech to a halt at the knowledge that someone had got entangled in his contraption. The moron-like behaviour on the part of drivers to turn a deaf ear to such SOS calls is explicable. Drivers are petrified at the thought of the likely consequences to follow if they should stop in response to public hollering. So they run for their lives.

This is not to condone what the drivers do under such circumstances, but that is the street reality we cannot make a short shrift of. That under no circumstances, should anybody take the law into his own hands will have to be ensured through a public education programme.

Basically, we need to sensitise the drivers and the pedestrians about the supreme need for abiding by traffic rules. Given the lack of road spaces, speed-limits should be followed by the drivers on pain of punishment. In Nahar's case, there is reason to believe that the man behind the wheel could have slowed down so as not to knock her down in the first place.

For their part, the pedestrians need to use the Zebra crossing and over-bridges. We better have more designated crossing points and speed-breakers (not humps), especially at busy stretches of thoroughfares.

Nahar would have lost her life in vain if traffic managers, transport operators and drivers and pedestrians did not draw lessons from her death.