(1888PressRelease)
March 01, 2007 - New Delhi, 28th February 2007. The cry of the visionaries of beautiful cities who profess by environment and concerns for living organisms of health, but not necessarily wealth, may well be understandable when they preach in all honesty and insist on being do gooders in the name of historic truths and tell us: Save the cities from the ravishers, land grabbers, builder mafias, vote bank politicians who are creating clusters of slums and occasionally settling them in new far away lands. The visionaries cannot be faulted on moral grounds or grounds of good governance, but if their lofty thoughts were carried out, what will happen: half of all the thousands towns and cities in 605 districts of 28 States and seven Union territories would be razed, regardless of the hue and cry, uproars, demonstrations and protests, leave alone fasts unto death, sit ins and law and order problems. Millions upon millions will be left out in the open in the upcoming summer, later monsoons and heavy rains and subsequent winter to fend for them or live or die as their fate proclaims.
The Master Plan of 2001-2027 for Delhi has been welcomed silently or criticized for ushering in urban chaos in the name of renewal of what is mistakenly believed to be a city with living organisms. New Delhi no doubt has a lot of good lungs. Even though it has been over the decades described as an overgrown village without a soul or culture, large parts of it remain what is a garden city, unlike perhaps any other in India.
Such harbingers of demolition squads were active during the Emergency from 1975 to early 1977. They were about to level the Yusaf Serai in New Delhi, but the shopkeepers of this South Delhi area next to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in what is known as Ansari Nagar outwitted them by putting up Congress flags by the hundred on their ramshackle buildings and pledged loyalty to Crown Prince Sanjay Gandhi. Nothing happened after that and traffic chaos continued for some decades until a few years ago when all encroachments were removed and more parking space created. There is still heavy traffic and jammed roads there in the absence of underpasses for motor vehicles turning right at three points at Green Park Extension, Green Park proper and from Hauz Khas to Aurobindo Marg.
This is just one little example of what is happening in all the megapolises as well as metropolises, big and small cities, big towns and small towns in the 605 districts of 28 States and seven Union territories of India. Will this ever stop? Time will not tell. Why? Because the writing on the wall is clear: the rural migration and migration from small towns to big ones and metropolises is unstoppable. The economic miracle that India is going through right now proclaims loudly that in a few years the urban population will overtake the rural. That is the price of progress a billion plus Indians have to pay.
It is accepted on all hands that the contribution of agriculture and related village activities, including poultry, dairying, crafts and handloom weaving already accounts for less than 27 per cent of the gross national product. This will go down further as the inevitable industrial revolution of India continues at breakneck speed, with manufacturing accounting for 12 per cent or more of annual growth even as the services sector has already overtaken industry in the national economic scene.
As big industries can be set up only on farm land, and not necessarily on wasteland, new townships are emerging even as there is a storm of protest over the special economic zones, which deprive cultivators of their hearths, homes and farmlands without adequate compensation, it is alleged by the supporters of the poor or the poorest of the poor. Some industrialists realizing that they must not overlook the interests of the sons of soil have promised, and in fact, started paying the land owners more than the prevailing market price, apart from ensuring their rehabilitation and provision of jobs in their planned projects. They do not face the excessive ire of politicians and kisan union lobbies. They include the main group of Reliance Industries and a few others even as industrialization over the decades gone by have devoured villages and farm lands. Kolkata, Patna, Chennai, Bangaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Kanpur, Lucknow, Jaipur and a host of other cities are witness to the overcrowding.
In this controversy over urban renewal, green belts, city forests, rose gardens, garden houses, the heritage aspect of the Lutyens City of New Delhi is brought into focus and its 75-year-old bungalows are sought to be preserved as single storey entities. Even though several areas of New Delhi's 16 square miles or kilometers are now multi storeyed and still being rebuilt, a plan has been drawn up to redesign less than 800 hectares on build, operate and transfer basis where the builders will get about 25 per cent of the area for commercial use to recover their huge investment and give back to the State, in this case the Central Government, the remaining area with a few stories of luxurious apartments.
Yet most Ministers and senior MPs and bureaucrats and army generals live in glorified splendour during their tenure of office and revert to Noida or cities in their home States in humbler dwellings? Is it logical? Rashtrapati Bhavan estate at the rear beyond Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital has decrepit bungalows and quarters. Should they not be rebuilt as was done in the case of South Avenue and North Avenue, land that was originally part of the Viceregal Lodge or Rashtrapati Bhavan Estate? Could not some Ministers be accommodated in some of the new plush but less spacious bungalows in that estate? Are security expenses of the poorly lit Lutyens city with avenues of trees, often plunged in darkness, not to great, to merit redesigning for logical and prudent reasons? Would it not be better use of space and precious land? Or must we hark back to imperial Delhi and preserve the memories of imperial British Raj even as their city of London has been changing its face in accord with modern times, as are most cities in Europe. But Lutyens is a sacred cow. No doubt or debate after a Unesco edict. Funny, indeed.
It is true that the beautiful Central Vista, the scene of the Republic Day Parade and the Ridge below the North and South Blocks of the Central Government will not be interfered with as the circular Parliament House is close by and pools of water and fountains divide the road. It is true that the India Gate and the National Stadium will remain as they are with the Princes Park adorning it. It is true that the Diplomatic Enclave with its own beautiful Central Vista will remain undisturbed.
It is true that Connaught Place with its new Central Park will be restored to its pristine glory in the near future and decongested with more underground parking lots and more will continue to be overtaken by incoming hoards of people from all directions of the country and by air from large parts of the world. The case of Darya Gunj and Chandni Chowk is a pointer even though the Silver Street may get back its trams and some old glory alongside the restoration and repainting of the Red Fort or Lal Qila. But will Delhi's frequent metro train services push the commuter crowds underground or will new ones will come up overground?
Yet much of the rest of Delhi or what used to be called Shahjehanabad and the glorious railway stations, will they also receive attention soon as is being done in the case of the airport. New wide roads and flyovers are giving a dashing look to parts of the city and satellite cities like Gurgaon and Noida are providing new havens as will several new cities further away.
The country must pay the price of a burgeoning economy for a billion plus people even though many must remain below the poverty line for long.
