I was just reading an article about the developments that have taken place in China and the way it’s been reforming itself. Slowly, steadily and with a single minded determination the country has been pursuing development, snubbing aside and ignoring all contrary beliefs of the world meant at disparaging its efforts. This is one thing that I respect in the country irrespective all the histories India-China have had.
On the other hand, we Indians are like some hard skinned animals. We think of a way out when the problem arises. Forget any long term visions even the short term ones are on ad hoc basis. To put things exactly, for example, the development of road happens only when they develop deep fissures, cracks and craters; dams are built after years of flood which is simply meant to check them with no concern whatsoever of its long term impacts, urban population is on an exponential rise and there seems to be no method to check this. I am not saying that some people should be selectively granted access to uptown place but what I am saying is that some initiatives needs to be taken to create opportunities everywhere even if it means a loss to the government. Its impacts mayn’t be immediate but it would show results only in the long term. But of course, this is how most of the people think- “What’s the point of doing all this… bear a big loss, and not even be able to take its credit.” Compare this with China, their infra is one of the most robust in the whole world, and so much of detailed engineering goes into them that we cannot even think of being anywhere close to their expertise. Sadly, we simple remain mere bystanders and spectators to this continuous development taking place in our neighborhood.
So instead of taking on the whole problem in one go we can simple break the task into smaller parts and take on them individually, somewhat like guerilla warfare. Take this for example (I take this example because this is one of the immediate problems I see in front of my eyes now that I am in Kolkata).
All Kolkata looks to me is a land of blue/red/white buses and yellow taxies. The roads are always a stream of vehicles one following the other. The thing that bugs me the most is the enormous use of private transportation here. It might sound ridiculous to some people who might say what’s wrong in this! But I want to ask what’s so right about this? Imagine if one person consumes 5-6 lts of fuel per day, occupies ~ 30 sq feet area on road; calculate how much 1000 or more people commuting here would contribute to the figure everyday! Of course it would be immediately countered by the argument of comfort they get and ‘If-I-earn-I-will-spend’ theory. Now here’s a plan to accommodate these concerns also. Just streamline everything.
But before suggesting changes I will give a brief on the traffic concerns in the city as the traffic woes of this place is a different story altogether. Thanks to the huge Kolkata population, irrespective of 100s of buses, taxis and the underground metro, the supply still falls short of demand here. Buses are always overcrowded; taxis are always reserved and even breathing gets difficult in the metro during peak traffic hours. When I first came to the city, I was shocked to see how even older women had to chase buses/ shuttles to board them. Girls avoid public transports for safety reasons. So people are mostly forced with no choice here.
But the important question is what can be actually done. We cannot ignore the fact that people like co-habiting with people who they think are like them or better than them, in terms of financial status, standard of living, mindset etc. So I will accommodate this fact in this streamlining model of commutation in Kolkata that I want to suggest. Just like we have economy class, business class planes, the same can be created for buses also. Create an id-card system for all people which would give them selective access to different buses. Simple restrict or downsize the number of taxies plying on road say for example by some lottery system. I am not saying it’s easy but it can be implemented. Lots of other planning like finding some other employment method for the people who thus lose their business has also to be done simultaneously. These buses should be very well maintained and a limit should be put on the number of people who would be allowed to travel standing to avoid overcrowding. Any deviation by anyone should be dealt with very strictly. There should be well maintained bus stops and all buses should strictly ply on time. It looks very animal like the way these buses move with a conductor hanging and howling “hada hada hada” and 10-15 people shoving each other to get in.
However just changing one aspect won’t be effective or long lasting unless a holistic approach is taken. There are some of the areas where I think serious intervention is needed. These are things very obvious but just because our eyes have become used to it and hence we are okay to it doesn’t mean that they can be ignored. Places like Esplanade, Chandini chowk are like some archaic places with the buildings being monuments in themselves. And south-Kolkata, whenever I pass through the place I always have this feeling that it’s a hub of infiltrated Bangladeshis. They are so much a part of Kolkata and the pathetic ambience there is so obvious that no local person here would even notice anything wrong.
Nobody likes changes which is even a law of nature (remember Newton’s 1st law- the law of inertia) and more when it is abrupt. However, if some drastic measures are not taken things will never go towards improvement but towards deterioration.
