The ghettoism prevalent across the world is spreading it’s tentacles in Mumbai too. As a kid, inequality based on religion or race existed only in history textbooks, and not in real life. Mumbai never gave me an opportunity to see anything so despicable. All that changed with the riots in ’92-93. The Muslim families moved out from our neighborhoods and now, there is a distinct demarcation of communities all across the city.
All my life, I have lived in and loved this city. Where else can one find a full fledged national park thriving right in the midst of a metropolis? The throb of humanity evident on the streets at all times make all other places seem like ghost towns. But what had otherwise been an efficient machine churning out the much needed finances of this grand nation is now reduced to being the milch cow of a select few. There is no point pinning the blame on any one group, each and every individual who has come here to live their dreams is to be blamed.
In an ideal situation, there should be an efficient administration that lets the inhabitants do what they have come to this city to do….make money. But that is not so, and the few public initiatives that try to redress the problems are hampered by the larger public apathy. These organizations have to face red tape, a non co-operative administration, an indifferent community as well as ego clashes amongst their own torch bearers.
I can’t forget my recent misadventure with a local effort to clean up a dirty river. A corporator tried to stop my photographing the river on the grounds that I was not a resident of the locality! Then the local activist who never could stop complaining about the need for a good website to publicize the common cause did an about turn when I published a blog on the river. That my intention was to start a rudimentary blog and then hand over the reins to the senior members of the group was conveniently forgotten. My photos were never returned. That put an end to a childhood dream.
Development means learning from other's mistakes and not re-inventing the wheel. India is well poised to avoid the mistakes that the industrial nations committed in the past, but it is fast becoming evident that what is being projected as progress is merely an excuse for big multi-nationals to dump obsolete technologies in our backyard.
Why isn't even local initiatives in clean transportation being supported? You have more flyovers being built, whereas in the West they are shifting the flyovers of the 50s underground to make way for more green spaces above. Hybrids are the rage there, whereas even unadulterated petrol is a dream in India. Society encourages one to buy a car even if it is not a necessity. The whole concept of current day automobiles is obsolete. We have now to move on to an entirely different alternative in transport. The technology exists, but the will doesn't. But change is inevitable. Mankind will change, or else perish and pave the way for another species.
