Life in India · Long View 2: Right to walk

A Guide to Health

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

In this chapter on exercise, Gandhi notes that walking has been described as the queen of all exercises. He recommends it as the next best exercise after gardening for anyone who does not work in the fields, urging people to walk outdoors into forests and fields rather than through city streets.

Book · added 29.09.2026

By Mohandas K. Gandhi. Translated by A. Rama Iyer.

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An Autobiography or The Story of My Experiments with Truth

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Mahatma Gandhi’s autobiography records how walking shaped his daily routine of health, economy and companionship across India, England and South Africa. It also describes the racial prohibitions in the Transvaal, where Indians were barred from public footpaths and a policeman kicked him into the street outside President Kruger’s house. Throughout his legal work and political campaigns, walking remained an indispensable discipline and mode of travel.

Book · added 29.09.2026

By M. K. Gandhi. Translated by Mahadev Desai.

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The Harmonist As It Is, Vol. 4 (VOL. XXVIII, June 1930 - May 1931)

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Harmonist, edited by Paramahansa Paribrajakacharyya Sri Srimad Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Goswami Maharaj, records Gaudiya Vaishnavism’s devotional practices, theological discourses and pilgrimage culture in the early twentieth century. Its reports document large congregations walking in procession to circumambulate holy sites such as Nabadwip, treating communal movement on foot as an act of public worship.

Book · added 29.09.2026

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Key to Health

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Gandhi wrote these chapters in late 1942 while imprisoned in the Aga Khan Palace in Pune, setting out his rules on diet, exercise, and natural care. In defining bodily health, he included daily walking as a benchmark: a healthy person ought to be able to walk ten to twelve miles a day with ease.

Book · added 29.09.2026

By M. K. Gandhi. Translated by Sushila Nayar.

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My Days with Gandhi

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Nirmal Kumar Bose’s memoir records his time as Mahatma Gandhi’s secretary and Bengali interpreter during the communal violence in Bengal and Bihar between 1946 and 1947. In Noakhali, Gandhi chose to move entirely on foot from village to village, halting one night in each hamlet to meet residents in their homes and prayer meetings. The book documents walking both as a rigorous daily habit and as an unarmed method of moral and political persuasion.

Book · added 29.09.2026

By Nirmal Kumar Bose.

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Bhoodan Yajna [Land-Gifts Mission]

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Vinoba Bhave began walking across India in 1951 to persuade landowners to donate five crore acres to the landless, starting in Telangana. This collection of his early speeches and articles treats the walking tour as a spiritual discipline inherited from teachers like the Buddha and Kabir, arguing that thought clarifies and matures on foot.

Book · added 29.09.2026

By Vinoba Bhave.

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The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi: Volume XLIII (March-June 1930)

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The forty-third volume of Mahatma Gandhi’s Collected Works covers the Salt March from March to June 1930, documenting his daily speeches, letters, and instructions on the road to Dandi. Gandhi treated the journey on foot as both a sacred pilgrimage and the prince of exercises, demanding rigorous discipline and daily spinning from the marchers. The writings show how walking across Gujarat transformed a political campaign into an act of communal self-purification.

Book · added 29.09.2026

By Mahatma Gandhi.

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The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Volume XC (November 11, 1947 - January 30, 1948)

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Volume XC closes the Collected Works with the last days of Gandhi’s life, and most of it is talk: letters, prayer-meeting speeches, and the editors’ notes on both. Walking runs through these pages as habit and as instruction. He tells two visitors from Kathiawar that he will talk with them “during my walk after the prayers, if I am alive”; in Noakhali he went no more than an hour on foot each day, under a broad straw hat against the sun; and in Delhi he wanted Suhrawardy to be able to walk the streets of the city. At a Guru Nanak birthday gathering he turned to the litter on the ground: roads and footpaths, he said, should be kept as clean as the floors of our houses.

Book · added 29.09.2026

By Mahatma Gandhi.

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Cankama Sutta: Walking

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Cankama Sutta sets out the physical and mental rewards of walking meditation, including the ability to endure travel on foot and the steadying of concentration. It records walking meditation as a practice that benefits bodily health alongside the mind.

Book · added 29.09.2026

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Walkability in Indian Cities

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

This report assesses pedestrian conditions across Bhubaneswar, Chennai, Indore, Pune, Rajkot, and Surat by surveying street infrastructure and interviewing pedestrians. It examines how municipal planning and capital spending neglect walkways, leaving walkers exposed to fast traffic, blocked paths, and absent crossings.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Clean Air Initiative for Asian Cities (CAI-Asia) Center.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Clean Air Initiative for Asian Cities (CAI-Asia) Center.

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Footpath design: A guide to creating footpaths that are safe, comfortable, and easy to use

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

A practical design guide translating the revised Indian Road Congress pedestrian standards into clear street templates. It sets out the three-part zoning system needed to keep walking paths continuous while accommodating utilities, trees, bus stops, and street vendors.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Advait Jani and Christopher Kost.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Institute for Transportation and Development Policy.

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Tirupati to Tirumala on Foot

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The page describes two well-laid stone footpaths up the hills to Tirumala for those who climb to fulfil a vow, the older starting from Alipiri and about 11 km long, and lists what Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams provides to pilgrims on foot: luggage carried free to the top, shelters, security patrols, medical help at any hour and canteens. APSRTC runs free buses from Tirupati railway station to Alipiri. Pilgrims who come on foot through Gali Gopuram or Srivari Mettu receive a token, and bio-metric counters on the paths enable free darshan, accommodation and food at Tirumala.

Scheme · added 29.09.2026

By Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams.

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Travel to Work in India: Current Patterns and Future Concerns

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Census 2011 was the first Indian census to ask workers how they travel to their jobs, and this 2018 report from the Transport Research and Injury Prevention Programme at IIT Delhi reads its district-level answers. Nearly a quarter of urban workers, 24.5%, make no trip at all to their workplace; about 70% of work trips are shorter than 5 km; and fewer than 5% are by car. Among workers who commute in urban India, women walk far more than men, 67.6% against 28.3%, and ride bicycles far less, 4.5% against 20.2%.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Geetam Tiwari and Nishant.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Transport Research & Injury Prevention Programme, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, New Delhi.

The report

The Practice of Pilgrimage: The Pandharpur Wari and Marathi Sant Kavis

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Kartikay Khetarpal writes on the wari to Pandharpur in Maharashtra, where devotees walk alongside palanquins carrying the footprints of sant-poets. Devotees travel in groups called dindis to eat, sing, and camp together across weeks on the road. Drawn largely from agrarian backgrounds, the pilgrims walk without restrictions on caste, and those in the Dyaneshwar procession address one another as Mauli.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Kartikay Khetarpal.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Sahapedia.

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NGT accepts panel recommendations regarding protection of environment in Govardhan and surrounding areas

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The National Green Tribunal accepted its oversight committee’s recommendations for the Govardhan and Radhakund area around Giriraj Parvat, the hill near Mathura-Vrindavan that pilgrims circle on the Parikrama path. The committee wanted work speeded up on a permanent dumping site, a boundary wall around the protected forest, a sewage network, a Radhakund bypass and multi-level parking, and it asked for all encroachments on the Parikrama Marg to be removed.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Sushil Batra.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to ANI News.

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Road Accidents in India 2022

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways compiles annual accident data from states and union territories, categorising deaths by vehicle and road user. In 2022, 32,825 pedestrians died on Indian roads, making them the second-largest group of fatalities after two-wheeler riders. The report records the mortal scale of walking.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Transport Research Wing, Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.

The report

Mass Mobilization through Perambulation: M.K. Gandhi

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Jasmine Anand examines how walking anchored M.K. Gandhi’s daily life, political philosophy, and civil resistance campaigns. The paper traces his practice from South Africa, where colonial laws banned Indians from footpaths, to the Salt March, showing how walking turned into an egalitarian political instrument.

Research paper · added 29.09.2026

By Jasmine Anand.

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Road Safety in India: Status Report 2023

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Researchers at IIT Delhi analysed official police records and national health surveys to examine fatal traffic crashes across India. They found that government statistics substantially undercount pedestrian fatalities, even though walkers, cyclists, and motorcyclists make up the vast majority of victims in both cities and intercity corridors. Road and highway designs, the authors argue, must be restructured to protect vulnerable road users rather than focusing narrowly on motor vehicles.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Geetam Tiwari and Rahul Goel and Kavi Bhalla.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Transportation Research & Injury Prevention Centre, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi.

The report

Hawkers Cannot be Allowed to Occupy Footpaths: Bombay High Court

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Bombay High Court held that a vendor’s right to trade cannot override a pedestrian’s right to safe passage on footpaths. Hearing a suo motu case on Mumbai street vending, the bench suggested mobile vending and pop-up markets instead of permanent stalls on walkways.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Law Trend.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Law Trend.

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Steps to Sustainability: The Impacts of New Footpaths on Mode Choice in Chennai, India

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Between 2013 and 2019 Chennai built footpaths on more than 100 km of streets, and in 2019 ITDP surveyed 424 people walking on four of them. Between 3% and 11% of those users said they would have gone by car or two-wheeler if the footpath had not been built, and the report puts the emissions saved at 4,200 to 12,000 tonnes of CO2-equivalent a year. Using a WHO model, the report credits the extra walking with preventing 340 premature deaths in 2019.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Madeline Liberman and D. Taylor Reich and Vaishali Singh and Aishwarya Soni and Achuthan TD and A V Venugopal.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Institute for Transportation & Development Policy (ITDP).

The report

Why it is so difficult to walk in Indian cities

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Cherylann Mollan reports on citizen activists mapping broken footpaths in Bengaluru, releasing a pedestrian manifesto in Mumbai, and pressing city administrations across India to design streets for walkers. Official estimates cited in the piece record over 10,000 pedestrian deaths on national highways in 2022, even as government statistics cited by an activist show almost half of Mumbai travels on foot.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Cherylann Mollan.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to BBC News.

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Road Accidents in India 2023

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The annual road accident report from the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways details the human toll on India’s roads in 2023. Pedestrians were the second most vulnerable category after two-wheeler riders, accounting for 35,203 deaths across the country.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Transport Research Wing, Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.

The report

The Erumeli Path | A Spiritual Trek to Sabarimala

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

A Kerala Tourism guide to the Erumeli route, the path pilgrims walk barefoot from Erumeli to the Sannidhanam at Sabarimala: two days over stones, thorns and dirt tracks up and down hillocks. It lists the landmarks in order, the Perur Canal, Irumboonikkara, the Azhutha river and the Karimala hill, and the rules that bind the walk: forest passes issued by the Department of Forests are needed beyond Irumboonikkara, and pilgrims may not cross the wild ground past the Azhutha after sundown. For a Long View about walking in India it offers a walk that is worship and hard going at once.

Post · added 29.09.2026

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Walking with Gandhi in Our Times

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The historian Janaki Nair examines Mahatma Gandhi’s walking as both physical discipline and political method, contrasting the mass mobilisation of the 1930 Dandi Salt March with his barefoot village journeys in Noakhali in 1947. She traces how long marches served as tests of personal endurance and communal reconciliation during the freedom struggle, asking what the practice offers Indian public life today.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Janaki Nair.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to The India Forum.

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Road Accidents in India 2024

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways compiles annual casualty figures reported by States and Union Territories across the country. In 2024, walking remained the second deadliest way to use a road in India after riding a two-wheeler, claiming 36,526 lives. In cities with over a million residents, pedestrians accounted for one in every four road accident fatalities.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Transport Research Wing, Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.

The report

Maniyar Iliyaz @ Shaik Riyaz & Anr. v. P. Ayyappan & Ors.

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Deciding an appeal over the death of a child run over by a tanker on his walk to school, the Supreme Court declared walking on demarcated footpaths a fundamental right under Articles 19 and 21 of the Constitution. The bench held that pedestrian movement takes priority over motorised vehicles, placing an enforceable duty on municipalities and panchayats to build and maintain footpaths along every road.

Supreme Court judgment · added 29.09.2026

By Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha and Atul S. Chandurkar.

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Over 1.8 lakh pedestrians killed in road accidents between 2019 and 2024; TN tops fatality list

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

More than 1.8 lakh pedestrians died in road accidents across India between 2019 and 2024, accounting for a fifth of all crash fatalities. Drawing on Ministry of Road Transport and Highways data, the report pairs these figures with the Supreme Court’s declaration that walking on a demarcated footpath is a fundamental right.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By TNIE online desk.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to The New Indian Express.

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India is a nation of walkers - but its cities forgot them

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Writing for BBC News after the Supreme Court recognised safe footpaths as a fundamental right, Soutik Biswas examines how Indian cities came to sideline pedestrians. Urban planning has focused on expanding road space for private cars, even as 45 million people walk to work daily and pedestrian deaths mount across major cities.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Soutik Biswas.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to BBC News.

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Pilgrims walk to Velankanni for annual feast

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Groups of devotees from Tiruchi, Thanjavur and the districts around them walk to Velankanni in Nagapattinam district for the annual feast of Our Lady of Good Health, some in ochre clothes and carrying flags, some pulling a chariot. Residents and voluntary organisations along the route put out drinking water and food. The report also records the danger of the journey: many pilgrims walk on the carriageway, some sleep in vacant spaces beside arterial roads after walking for long hours, and fatal accidents are reported every year.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Ancy Donal Madonna.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to The Hindu.

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How safe is it to walk on India’s roads?

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

An article built from the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways’ Road Accidents in India 2024, which counts the people police recorded as killed while walking: 36,526 pedestrians in 2024, about 100 a day, 20.6 per cent of all road deaths. It sets those counts beside the Supreme Court’s June 2026 ruling in Maniyar Iliyaz v. P. Ayyappan, which held that the right to walk includes demarcated footpaths. The tables count deaths; they say nothing about how far or how often people walk, so they cannot measure how risky a walk is.

Reporting · added 29.09.2026

By Bhuvanesh.

Excerpt quoted for review under section 52 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The report belongs to This Indian Life.

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