Besides being a Congress Member of India’s Parliament, Shashi Tharoor is known also for using impeccable English. So, it was no surprise when he discussed the word ‘jaywalking’ in a personal blog, claiming — and perhaps rightly so — that “whatever may be our political differences, all Indians have one thing in common: jaywalking”.

Tharoor’s research, as reflected in the blog, found that there “are laws against jaywalking in the US, Singapore, Poland, Serbia, Iran, Australia and New Zealand”.

However, in India, there is no universal law or legislation that forbids walking or crossing streets in violation of traffic regulations, even when pedestrian deaths on urban roads are a matter of growing concern. This is often attributed to insufficient walking infrastructure across India’s large cities, bursting at the seams with dense population.