DailyPost 2172
URBAN MISERY – SUPERTECH TWIN TOWERS TO A SINKING IT CITY
The short journey time of these two events speaks with utmost clarity the nature of urban misery that is bestowed on us. Lutyens Delhi still stands tall after decades of existence with hardly any semblance of wear and tear from a city planning point of view. Even the trees on the sides of those roads have a method. We have Jamshedpur long many years back with the nature of amenities and city planning features which famed builders and city planners are not able to deliver today. Chandigarh has not been a very old story. What cities are meant to be theoretically from every angle, is known to municipal corporations, city planners, architects and builders.
We have a history of cities following us from the famed Indus Valley Civilization. I presume all stakeholders are aware of it. Before Supertech Twin Towers was legally made to bite the dust, everyone involved in that monument of shame should have landed in prison, at the very least. Shame as a deterrent in our society was lost long time back. To create such monuments of shame, needs much more meticulous planning and execution capabilities, than to follow city planning guidelines. How such elements are able connive with precision and deliver rock solid results over and over again, is the tragedy of country. Or is that the system?
Anyone else is rebel. All agencies, government, municipal bodies, private companies, builders and all connected work accordingly. The laid-out rules, laws and procedures are reduced to a sham. What can be seen by our naked eyes has to proven by each one of us. An audit of few cities, with only a couple of localities in each of these, will lay threadbare as to what we have created; from individual houses, to apartment complexes, to gated communities and what not? The state of city infrastructure outside of the areas mentioned? Do we need an audit? The pics / videos of the urban misery in Bangalore will soon fade and the civic agencies and stakeholders will start building up their cases, ppt upwards to super indulgence. Is it a total loss of conscience or urban naxal approach, nemesis or mine.
People with higher incomes have decided to cut themselves from the civic governance of the areas / cities they live in. They have been making their habitats of luxury, not even in imagination thinking of the sinking city interface, that can happen. Oasis sort of a thing in urban squalor. In the same way as Covid-19 brought us face to face with health reality, the sinking city experience will make you a feel a little more equal. The more the indifference of ones who can make a difference, emboldens the city mercenaries; municipal and otherwise to make a kill. Can this be the only interface of the citizens with the city administrators and service providers? Rest is all approval / execution regimen which all of us can only be ashamed of. Who will the get the Bangalore image back? Are cities not made to withstand known bouts of rain?
MEGA CITIES ARE GROWTH ENGINES OF ANY NATION, CAN THEY BE PUT TO SHAME?
Sanjay Sahay