The traditional blue and green signage with names of roads and chowks are fast making way for those with the saffrongreen combination across the city. The only exception is old Pune comprising the Peth areas that continue to have the black signages with white radium.

Even as citizens want the signage to be legible, recent changes in the colour pattern have raised many an eyebrow.

“We want all the signage to be legible with white radium and reflectors. The signage should not be confusing. For instance, an ‘X’ mark has been painted on a blue signage and people are unable to understand its meaning. The civic body must follow the international standard,” IT professional Rafique Shaikh said.

Retired IPS officer Rajendra Sonawane said, “A lot of saffron boards have come up in various parts of Pune. The Pune Municipal Corporation ( PMC ) should stick to the standard format for signage. The words in white on the saffron-cum-green signages are not legible because the colours are odd. The names of corporators should not be mentioned on the boards as well. A proposal to saffornise the signage was opposed by an IAS officer, when he was the general manager of BEST and MSRTC in 2007-08.”

He added that the British had started using red, green, black and blue as the signage colours for a reason. “The armed forces had switched over to the blue flag from the red one with white letters and this practice was adopted by all. Vehicles and public transport have white and yellow number plates with registration numbers written in black.”

When the Congress was at the helm of affairs in the PMC, and also later along with the NCP as an alliance partner, the signage was in blue and green with the words on them in white. Many residents said the new trend started setting in after the BJP won the 2017 civic elections.

The BJP’s argument is that there is no law in place to install signage in specific colours. BJP MLA Yogesh Tilekar (Hadapsar constituency) said there’s no provision in the Motor Vehicles Act to install signage of a particular colour. “The new signage has been installed for people’s convenience. These boards are legible with details of wards, names of roads, chowks and housing societies. There are no complaints from the public,” he said.

BJP executive member Pravin Jadhav said, “Rapid urbanization, rise in population and merger of fringe villages increased the demand of such signage. There is nothing wrong in installing saffron boards as they are helping the people.”

