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Disasters in the making

By rights, I suppose I should be writing about either Bihar or the Budget. Well, I won't, partly because I'm so tired of writing about politicians and partly because I don't know what is happening anyway. I am writing on a train speeding from Kerala to Delhi, without access to radio, television, and (blessed relief!) even the cell-phone is silent. To be honest, I planned it that way, if there are no constraints as far as time is concerned I prefer train journeys.

This genial mood lasted until the attendant served coffee. Will someone please tell me why the Indian Railways insist on serving it in thin plastic cups? It is impossible to hold it without burning your hand, and by the time it cools it tastes distinctly foul. Worse was to follow. Looking out of the window, I was horrified to see a trail of plastic on both sides of the tracks. It wasn't just those wretched cups, but wrapping in all the shades of the rainbow used to package a variety of junk food. It continued without break from Kerala, through Tamil Nadu, through Andhra Pradesh, and only sunset has brought an end to this depressing sight as we whiz through Maharashtra.

Not too long ago, food used to be served either on china and steel, or on leaf-plates and earthen cups. That last option, though some turned up their city-bred noses, was probably the most hygienic of the lot being used once and then thrown away. It didn't matter too much even if you chucked it out of the window -- leaves and mud don't harm the environment. But then at one stroke everything changed, thousands of small artisans found no takers for their wares, and literally tons of plastic will continue to pollute India for generations to come.

I have a couple of questions on this: why was the decision made to allow this invasion of plastic and who took the decision anyway? Believe me, it is a question that strikes right at the heart of the democratic principle. Why are we, the people most affected, almost invariably ignored when faceless bureaucrats make rulings that affect our lives?

It isn't just the Indian Railways you see, but practically everything. When I left Delhi, some government agency was making preparations to put up a flyover at one of the city's busiest junctions, the intersection of Ring Road and Aurobindo Marg. To my horror they were cutting trees with mad abandon as far as South Extension, which is a good kilometre or more away. Some of the brutally uprooted trees had been dumped in a park in a half-hearted attempt at transplantation; they were dead within twenty-four hours.

Note that I said 'some government agency'; that is no more than the simple truth as I have no idea which of the many busybodies in Delhi was responsible for this mass murder. It doesn't matter anyway -- every one of them, whether in the Union or the Delhi government, is equally callous. In fact, that is true of almost all the projects supposedly aimed at development.

One of the dirty secrets of all those 'temples of modern India' initiated by Pandit Nehru and slavishly imitated thereafter is that they are all disasters in the making. How many of those massive hydro-power plants have actually produced all the power or irrigated all the acres as were so lavishly promised? And how about all those expensive schemes to link rivers -- has any government actually considered schemes to harvest rain-water?

Something is better than nothing, and at least some benefits are there in the form of electricity and stored water. But who gains through the mania for road-widening in places like Delhi and Mumbai? Temporary advantages will be negated by the increase in the number of vehicles. There is, of course, no serious effort to put up a decent public transport system, nor to improve what already exists.

I remember seeing a nineteenth-century photograph taken from the Qutab Minar; in the distance you could make out Balban's tomb. When I arrived in Delhi I tried to take in the same vista. I couldn't -- when the city became India's capital, the British planted scores of trees. (Few realise it, but Delhi marks the last spurs of the Aravalli range.) Now I wonder if my grandchildren can, once again, see Balban's mausoleum from the Qutab...

Mistakes made in Bihar or with the Budget can be corrected sooner or later. Who shall pay the environmental bills when they fall due?

T V R Shenoy