Stop the kidnap policy of public space by the Mumbai municipal corporation and the government. That was the theme of a public meeting held at St Michael’s church auditorium in Mahim last evening. Kidnap is perhaps too mild a word for the most condemnable attitude of the authorities who may be said to be vandalising our public life in the[Read More…]
The website of the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre claims that the Grand Theatre is technologically most advanced in India, is magical and meticulously designed. But what is the reality? Many in the audience have complained of serious problems. After spending thousands of rupees for one seat, you find that the bar in front of your seat makes it hard[Read More…]
Such a pleasure it was to hear and meet last evening Stockholm-based political scientist and history scholar Ishtiaq Ahmed. And such a versatile man, so academically sound, so articulate, he is not only an acknowledged scholar on Pakistan he has just authored a book on the contribution of pre partition Punjab to the film industry. It will be of great[Read More…]
The new Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre in Mumbai as of now is all about money, money, money, opulence, display of wealth and the personality cult. Last evening I was there looking at a Pichai art work in the foyer when an attendant in a hushed, polite voice told me – Ambani sir is coming. After some time Mukesh Ambani[Read More…]
The deaths due to poor arrangemens at the Maharashtra government organised big gathering in Navi Mumbai on April 16 are also a pointer to the new class of alleged spiritual leaders . Maharashtra has a living Warkari tradition of devotion, there is no religious leader involved,people voluntarily walk in a spirit of piety to the Vithal temple in Pandharpur for[Read More…]
In the current summer one would like to have a good swim or like to teach children how to swim. But there are barely eight municipal swimming pools in the sprawling big metropolis Mumbai for a population of nearly 17 million people There are a large number of private[Read More…]
Swapna Liddle is not only a very good scholar of the history of Delhi, she is a very good communicator both in her writing and in speaking, one can understand so much from her whether it is about the changes to the Central vista in Delhi or the 1857 rebellion or the walks through historic areas of the capital. In[Read More…]
Pune Metro railway has become a laughing stock. Few people are travelling and there are any number of jokes on the social media that it should be let out for wedding parties and other celebrations. Mercifully, it has spared the historic district, it has not gone there. Jaipur Metro has done that . It is also a big failure as[Read More…]
A visit to the Maharashtra government archives in the historic Elphinstone college building Mumbai on March 29 was depressing. The archives are fine with their valuable records dating back to the East India company and Shivaji era but reaching there is messy. Old chairs, tables and other furtniture are dumped in the passage and adjoining areas. What a contrast to[Read More…]
We can expect little improvement in our urban transport system considering what could be termed as inadequate understanding of the issue shown by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his post budget webinar last week. He emphasised Metro rail network as a key driver not realising the extremely poor record in most ciies. Even the moderate Marathi daily Maharashtra Times in[Read More…]
Eduardo Galeano was best known for his 1971 book Open Veins of Latin America, which rocketed to the top of US bestseller lists after the Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez presented a copy to President Barack Obama in 2009 It is one of the most inspiring and monumental works against imperial exploitation. We now have a slender but valuable translation into[Read More…]
Metro work causing havoc in Surat, in Mr Modi’s home state. In Mumbai bus transport is neglected. The prohibitively costly Metro rail project has caused disruption on a massive scale in different cities in India. But nowhere else more than in Surat in the Prime Minister’s home state of Gujarat. And also in Mumbai. Metro Mokan says today’s edition of[Read More…]
A poet in Russia is more than a poet,” Yevgeny Yevtushenko, a leading author of his time, famously stated. He knew what he was talking about. During Nikita Khrushchev’s cultural years of Thaw, Soviet poets were public figures like rock stars. They performed to sell-out crowds, predicted the future and helped get over the past. Poetry, like any form of[Read More…]
So many serving and retired bureaucrats and politicians live and work in the vicinity of Y.B. Chavan Centre in Mumbai but few attend significant events there. Felt this particularly after watching the opening film at the Chavan international film festival last evening. The film Holy Spider directed by Iranian film maker Ali Abbasi is particularly relevant to our times since[Read More…]
The game has changed . A new narrative has begun. Now Adani Realty is in BKC’ says the slogan on the wall of the upcoming high rise Adani building. The irony is that it is right opposite the building of MHADA, Maharashtra housing and area development authority in Bandra east in Mumbai.It is an affront to the whole concept of[Read More…]
One of the most successful plays in New York in the last few days is against the planner Robert Moses who destroyed so many poor neighbourhoods in the city, promoted the car lobby, worked against public transport. He was strongly opposed by Jane Jacobs, a pro people urban planner who fought automobile dominance. The play portrays the conflict between the[Read More…]
Mr R.C. Bhargava, the high profile chairman of Maruti Suzuki, and the likes of him owe an explanation to the public for the situation so visible in many places in the country. There is a blatant encroachment by the motor car showroom on the footpath as well as the prominent artery S.V. Road in Bandra in Mumbai. And a serious[Read More…]
Mr B.V. Doshi, renowned architect who passed away in Ahmedabad on January 24 at the age of 96, was a big institution builder but towards the end of his life he had come to realise that architects should think not only of rich clients but ordinary people. Many tend to look at Mahatma Gandhi as anti-modern, anti machinery. But he[Read More…]
In terms of beauty, Bandra suburban railway station in the Victorian Gothic style , is next only to the world heritage site of Victoria Terminus now Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus. The Bandra heritage station, built in the 19th century, is now restored after more than two years of work , looks impressive and is to be inaugurated by this month end.[Read More…]
Charles Dickens, the celebrated 19th century novelist, earned good money through public reading of his works in England and the U.S.to wipe out his father’s and his own debt. His parents and younger brothers had been carted off to debtors’ jail. Only 12-year-old Charles stayed behind, working in a blacking factory to pay their bills. Those long miserable months,an obsever [Read More…]
During a visit to the FTII campus in Pune last week, I found that it looked more like an army camp. There were policemen in army-type uniforms all over. One was followed everywhere by a jawan. Even a visitor to Pakistan is treated with more discretion, I found that during a visit there to attend a peace conference 20 years[Read More…]
The Prime Minister and others glorifying the speed culture on our highways should read this and ponder. Hundreds of vehicles ran over a man on the highway near Miraj in Maharashtra , parts of his body were scattered all over. No driver cared to stop. This is speed culture for you. The Nagpur-Shirdi stretch of the Samruddhi Mahamarg inaugurated by[Read More…]
It is surprising that Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde and deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis embarked on the speed misadventure on the Samruddhi Mahamarg highway on December 4, so soon after the death in a road crash of Cyrus Mistry, former chairperson of Tata group. Mr Fadnavis himself was at the wheel driving at a speed of some 120 km[Read More…]
Bharat Raul’s family lived a happy life in a nice single storey settlement , Wadi, amidst coconut trees in a prime area in Mahim in Mumbai in the 1960s. Then the municipal corporation displaced it along with others for civic works and relocated them to five storey buidings near Mahim east station. . This is fine area with trees, wide[Read More…]
The poor are often unfairly blamed for straining Mumbai’s infrastructure, making it dirty.In fact, it can be argued that It is the rich who are in good measure responsible for making it dirty, consuming most of the land, grabbing more and more of it from the poor, causing severe road congestion and air pollution with their cars. One has only[Read More…]
Duncan Stone’s new book Different Class: The Untold Story of English Cricket has important lessons for Indian cricket and sports. It does not merely challenge the orthodoxy of English cricket, it demonstrates how the values and belief systems at its heart were developed in order to divide, rather than unite, the English at every level of the game. It was[Read More…]
The discussion on football in India was so evasive about real issues at the Tata literature festival last Sunday in the context of the world cup football beginning this Sunday in Qatar. The whole focus was on commercialisation of the game, not democratisation, it was all about how to exploit the game for money and profits. There is a great[Read More…]
I attended an international conference on urban transport mobility in Kochi last week from November 4 to 6. After listening to ministers, bureaucrats and others at this conference as well as earlier meetings, one gets the clear impression that we are in for serious problems of road congestion and pollution. Things are going to become worse despite all tall talk[Read More…]
Saw Aaditya Thackeray, the young, embattled Shiv Sena leader at a public event last week. He was cheerful, showed no sign of stress. Seems to have taken the recent political setback in his stride. Things are clearly looking up for Shiv Sena and the Congress. He inaugurated a play area for physically and mentally challenged children in Joggers Park in[Read More…]
Kumar Shiralkar, activist, served the adivasis and other oppressed people for decades with great devotion and selflessness.. He in turn was so much loved by the adivasis that after his passing way on October 2 they buried his body. Kumar was born in a Brahmin family but he had completely given up his caste and class affiliation, totally identified with[Read More…]
Annabhau Sathe, was an immensely admired dalit communist writer, performer who galvanised people’s struggles in Mumbai in the 1940s and 1950s. Seeing a revival of his play on Mumbai’s working people’s struggles against capitalist domination, written in the 1950s, makes one realise that he in way preceded eminent urban radical thinkers like David Harvey and Henri Lefebvre who have emphasised[Read More…]
Maharashtra’s progressive record has taken a beating in the last few years. But occasionally there are signs of hope. One of the best reprsentatives of the progressive tradition was Narhar Kurundkar. He was a real public intellectual, atheist, rationalist, outspoken critic whoquestioned almost ridiculed false,established notions. The orthodox told him he would go to hell but they could do not[Read More…]
The sudden realisation in elite circles of the need to wear seat belts for passengers in rear seats of cars in the wake of the death of Mr Cyrus Mistry, former Tata group chief, on September 4 is important. But it misses a vital point. It shows all the concern for the safety of car occupants, the rich, while there[Read More…]
The sad death of former Tata group chairman Cyrus Mistry in a road crash in Maharashtra on September 4 should create more awareness about the need for road safety. It is for the first time that such a high profile corporate figure has met with a road crash in recent years. This is mainly because corporates travel more by air[Read More…]
The recent political upheaval in Maharashtra is being seen mainly in a conventional way as a power struggle. But there is a serious need to go beyond that. One should never forget that the Shiv Sena is the creation of the Congress in the 1960s to defeat the then strong Communist movement, then came the murder of Communist MLA Krishna[Read More…]
Few people have such a privileged and unique background as Anamika Haksar whose experimental film Ghode Ko Jalebi Khilane Ja Riyan Hoon was released in a few cities in small theatres on June 15 She is the daughter of P.N. Haksar, one of our most respected administrators and an ardent Communsit in early days . She worked with Badal Sircar[Read More…]
It seems the government machinery which is so arrogant towards common people, listens only to voices of aggression. The officialdom sat meekly, almost scared yesterday on the dais in front of a large gathering of Aagri community farmers, men and women, during a public hearing on Metro 9 railway line. Scared indeed because there were two police officers on the[Read More…]
Few men can give us a better understanding of the saffronisation of archaeology and the temple mosque controversy than Ashish Avikunthak. He has spent 20 years researching Indian archaeology, he is a sensitive film maker, social activist, a multi faceted figure.He has a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Stanford university, he teaches archaeology and film studies in Rhodes Island university[Read More…]
This is a mild punishment for the arrogant IAS officer of Delhi but there is some imagination in it. He has been shunted to Ladakh bordering Pakistan and his IAS officer wife sent to the other end of the country to Arunachal Pradesh bordering China. A positive fallout of the case is that stadiums in Delhi will now be open[Read More…]
The Metro rail network is failing miserably in different cities. In Bangalore steps to check the falling ridership of Namma Metro are not helping. Its daily pass scheme too has drawn poor response. In a city of millions, only four people bought a three day pass costing Rs 400 on April 5. With the pass you can travel any number[Read More…]
The Metro railway in Mumbai may at some later date prove a success. But as of now it seems to fit the mindset of megalomaniacs obsessed with power and delusions of grandeur. It is perhaps a cruel coincidence that the monumentally expensive network was opened by the chief minister on the Hindu new year day on April 2 when millions[Read More…]
What kind of Swachh Bharat and modern urbanisation we are creating ? Let us start with Bandra suburban station in Mumbai, one of the oldest and prized heritage stone buildings, with its red tile roof. A perfectly functioning toilet for men and women here was demolished recently and now there is no toilet, urinal of any kind on any[Read More…]
Narendra Modi, Prime Minister, unwittingly admitted today that the operation of Metro railway network in India is a failure. He was inaugurating short stretches of two Metro lines in Pune. He appealed to people to travel by the Metro. It was in the tone of desperation of a salesman who knows the product is expensive and does not meet real[Read More…]
In the death of Mr N.D. Patil on January 17 we have lost a dedicated, honest leader of the Peasants and Workers Party. His wife Saroj is the sister of Mr Sharad Pawar and the two leaders represent two contrasting approaches to politics. Mr Pawar, the leader of the Congress and then the National Congress party, in fact comes from[Read More…]
Debashish Mukerji’s new book The Disruptor How Vishwanath Pratap Singh shook India has come at a rather topical time as the OBC reservation issue is back in the news. I have another reason to relate to the subject as I covered the OBC agitation in the 1980s in Maharashtra for the Times of India. And I had occasion to preside[Read More…]
While the negative aspects of Mr Narendra Modi are obvious, it has to be conceded that he has a sense of theatre, spectacle, performance, visualization. He memorises key lines. He is a talented performer. This was clear from his speech and choreographed scenes during the performance at the big show he and the authorities mounted in Varanasi on December 13.[Read More…]
It is good that Aditya Thackeray, Maharashtra’s young environment minister, found time during his visit for the recent Glasgow climate summit to study the working of London Transport organization. He noticed that London operates 9000 buses, 75 per cent of them double deckers. He made the point during a conference on infrastructure yesterday. He did no talk about the[Read More…]
At one end of this road in the former textile mill dominated area in Mumbai is the office of the CPM, Communist party of India (Marxist) and the other is the comrade P.K. Kurne chowk square in Worli. But the area in between is being gentrified as no other in this former working class city. High rise luxury towers have[Read More…]
The Piramals are the in-laws of the Mukesh Ambani family. This article has for its reference point a new high rise luxury building recently built by the Piramals in Mumbai. The capture of textile mill land by capitalists and throwing out thousands of workers from central area in Mumbai is one of the biggest land scandals in modern India. I[Read More…]
Many parts of the world observed today, September 22, as the international car-free day, a day for freedom and safety for pedestrians. The United Nations has supported priority for pedestrians. But the Indian government is busy encouraging cars, it has just announced a productivity linked incentive (PLI) scheme to subsidise the industry to the tune of thousands of crores of[Read More…]
As one enters the Air India staff colony in Kalina in Mumbai one is struck by the large football field, a lovely sight right at the entrance. The ground is now full of overgrown grass. It is a very big complex with abundant greenery and other very large open spaces. With the forthcoming privatization we will lose this vital space.[Read More…]
Poems for Lenin. That was the title of a collection of poems written by Satish Kalsekar, noted Marathi poet, in 1977. His passing way on July 24 is a great loss for the Left movement and literature at the national level because he built bridges with writers from other languages. His death was widely mourned with tributes flowing in from[Read More…]
It is surprising India does not figure in the Venice architecture biennale exhibition, perhaps the most important architecture international event. It is on currently, it opened last month. With all its aggressive posturing on the Central vista project, the Indian government should have showcased the project to the world. Even small countries are participating ,ranging from Albania to Uzbekistan. Our[Read More…]
I was very sad to hear of the death this morning of Dinesh Mohan, noted expert on road safety, in St Stephen’s hospital in Delhi. It is a big loss to the international campaign for road safety, he was a consultant to many countries and currently the U.N. is observing a road safety week. He did pioneering research on road[Read More…]
One does not see disturbing images of oxygen and bed shortage in Mumbai as are being seen from other cities during the Covid crisis. But he well-organised media hype over Mumbai’s handling of Covid is likely to give a very misleading picture to the outside world that all is well in the Metropolis.The picture is far from rosy. It is[Read More…]
A prominent , senior journalist in Delhi is seriously injured by a car allegedly driven by a senior defence organisation official, she dies later and the media does not even report this. What does this tell us of the state of our media ? She was injured on March 25 and succumbed to her injuries on April 22. . It[Read More…]
Bimal Roy is one of our most loved film directors and his legacy will continue to live on on the basis of his work. Luckily, we have amidst us his daughter Rinki Roy Bhattacharya who has done so much for us to further understand, appreciate his work by organizing numerous screenings of his films, running an active organization in his[Read More…]
A.R. Kardar was one of the biggest personalities of the Hindi film world. He was also very versatile as a writer, actor, producer, director and studio owner. His Kardar studio in Parel in Mumbai is now reduced to a big motor car repair garage, a fact the glamorous film world is not aware of. His daughter Yasmeen reminisces that the[Read More…]
One possible reason common people’s basic problems remain unsolved is that our politicians and bureaucrats live in such absolute comfort, unmindful of people’s misery. Take the example of MMRDA, Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority. It has a plush, shining modern office in the Bandra Kurla complex, the corporate district of Mumbai. Its top officials live just one building away on[Read More…]
Joggers Park in Bandra in Mumbai is an iconic site and even a Hindi film with the same name has been made with the Park as the location. Sensible people always support the public sector. But in this case it is found that the municipal corporation has created a big mess of it after taking it over from private builders[Read More…]
All the books and valuable documents from the library of the Maharashtra government’s headquarters, Mantralaya, in Mumbai are dumped since the last three years into a godown, no one knows where. The same is the case with the Central library which the Maharashtra government is supposed to look after. The library is one of the four libraries in the country[Read More…]
Mr Durga Shankar Mishra, the secretary of the union ministry of urban affairs, says that his son, an architect, cycles seven km from his home to his office in Delhi and back every day. That is the encouraging part. The younger generation can usher in a change. The not so good part is that most bureaucrats and politicians have little[Read More…]
The discussion on the new education policy so far seems to have omitted the subject of text books. The quality of most text books so far is considered quite poor, especially of books in English language for English medium students… This has been going on year after year, the same mistakes are repeated in next editions. Let me cite the[Read More…]
The controversial demolition of the allegedly illegal construction in film star Kangana Ranaut’s bungalow at Pali Hill in Bandra on September 9 should be seen in a broader perspective. The crux is that over the years there is a tacit understanding between sections in the State government, the municipal corporation and the rich about land grab and illegal construction, enjoying[Read More…]
• Journalists, because they can rub shoulders with so-called VIPs, start thinking that they too belong to the elite circle. Over the years many in the profession enjoying good perks, have started looking down on trade unions of journalists. But with Covid leading to loss of jobs and health hazards, it is time for a rethink. • In Maharashtra the[Read More…]
It would be good if our politicians and bureaucrats did a little introspection like Bangalore’s traffic police commissioner Ravikanthe Gowda. He said he had not travelled by a bus for the last twenty years and we make decisions about public transport without using public transport ourselves and without involving people who are real users. This situation has to change, he[Read More…]
This is important for developing immunity to Covid and other infections and build resistance. Researchers are now pointing out the manifold benefits of rewilding of Nature for human health and well-being. This means we need to expose ourselves to more bio diversity, be in touch with a wide variety of plant life, not just manicured, artificial lawns. According to Jacob[Read More…]
Here is an opportunity to stress the demand for democratisation of road space. The government dare not accuse the activists of being urban Naxals because its own guidelines in the wake of Covid suggest creating more space on roads for bicycles and pedestrians. Various studies conducted by the ministry of housing and urban affairs MoHUA show that about 16-57% of[Read More…]
One of the memorable productions of Ebrahim Alkazi was Dharmavir Bharati’s Hindi play Andha Yug whose title and theme are so relevant to the dark times we live in. It was directed by the doyen of Indian theatre in 1963 against the backdrop of Purana Quila, the fort, and was witnessed by Jawaharlal Nehru. The story hints at the perils[Read More…]
It would be interesting to recall in the context of the current India China relations that Liu Shaoqi’s book How to be a Good Communist was translated into Gujarati in the 1940s by Chandrakant Parikh, a full time CPI worker, in Mumbai. How much history has changed. Gujarat has come to this sad pass politically today. But it had a[Read More…]
The central government’s ministry of housing and urban affairs has recommended holistic planning for pedestrian friendly market spaces in various cities and municipal areas in the country in consultation with stake holders. The advisory issued by Mr Durga Shanker Mishra, department secretary, last month has also suggested million plus cities to select at least three market places for pedestrianisation &[Read More…]
Beginning in December 1951, Ernesto “Che” Guevara took a nine-month break from medical school to travel by motorcycle through Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela. One of his goals was gaining practical experience with leprosy. Being in contact with people who were poor and hungry while they were sick transformed Che. He envisioned a new medicine, with doctors who would[Read More…]
Municipal authorities mercilessly chopping grass in parks in Mumbai and elsewhere are doing a distinct disservice to the city, to Nature and to people who love to walk on grass which is not only fun but also immensely beneficial to health. Mr Praveen Pardeshi, the former municipal commissioner of Mumbai, had a good understanding of these issues. Thick grass is[Read More…]
We are in the midst of a new mobility revolution, declared Mr Narendra Modi, Prime Minister, at the global mobility summit in New Delhi in 2018. The gentleman who waxed eloquent on mobility then was completely silent in his recent address to the nation about the misery of thousands of workers stranded , immobilised all over the country without shelter[Read More…]
There can be some positive gains from the impact of Corona. People can take back , reclaim spaces that belong to them. In Mumbai the fancy dome of the National Sports Club of India, a site of beauty and fashion pageants, a playground for the rich, has been taken over by the municipal corporation for quarantine. It is originally a[Read More…]
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the Nobel prize winning writer, wrote a classic essay Why Allende Had to Die in New Statesman in 1974 on the coup in Chile in 1973 in which socialist President Salvador Allende was killed. He gives details of U.S. involvement in the coup and a lot of subsequent research reaches that conclusion. The United States, now facing[Read More…]
The onset of the Corona virus and the subsequent lockdown have crippled Maharashtra’s economy and this will impact Mumbai. It has also completely changed the way people think. The Gods have become helpless, they have abandoned the field, they have failed to work miracles, declared an article in the Shiv Sena mouthpiece daily Samnaa written by Sanjay Raut, editor. He[Read More…]
Since the Corona crisis is grave, the government’s decision to stop train services throughout the country till March 31 cannot be faulted. But this has grave implications for the poor. They are going to be stranded and worse, many will lose their livelihood as they cannot reach their work places. Train services had been hit in 1974 during a prolonged[Read More…]
We are being told to wash our hands (for 20 seconds!) and self-isolate if sick. But what if you cannot do either of those things? One billion people live in slums or informal settlements where water for basic needs is in short supply – let alone 20 seconds worth – and where space is constrained and rooms are often shared.[Read More…]
In one respect Donald Trump seems less autocratic than Narendra Modi. Just as Modi and his administration have sought to completely redesign the area around Parliament in Delhi, Donald Trump wants to “make federal buildings beautiful again” by mandating a return to “the classical architectural style”, according to a draft executive order. But there is one essential difference. Trump’s order[Read More…]
One aspect ignored regarding the Shaheen Bagh protests on the citizenship issue in Delhi is the issue of denial of public space to people, increasing restraints on acces to existing such spaces.Civil liberties groups urban planners should seriously study, take up these issues.The Supreme court raised questions on February 10 about protests on roads in Delhi . It would be[Read More…]
It is a shame that some 30,000 books of the Mantralaya library in Mumbai have been dumped into a godown. Clearly, the government cares more for motor cars than books. It has no space for books but proposes to build a car park under Mantralaya to park 700 cars at a cost of Rs. 70 crores. Besides, the move totally[Read More…]
Chief minister Uddhav Thackeray’s decision to stay construction of the Metro rail car shed at the controversial Aarey forest site in Mumbai needs to be seen in the proper perspective. The point is people are not against development, they are against an insensitive system riding rough shod over them. The point is people are seeing through the one size fits[Read More…]
The Modi government’s extravagant projects are being seriously questioned by experts. These include the Metro rail projects and the absurdly expensive proposed high speed railway between Mumbai and Ahmedabad. With the Shiv Sena-led coalition government assuming power in Maharashtra, the high speed project is likely to face strong opposition. Metro railway alone cannot solve urban traffic and transport problems. There[Read More…]
A much bigger fight lies ahead for sensitive citizens after the brutal felling of over 2000 trees under cover of darkness in Aarey colony in Mumbai. The massacre was carried out for the Metro rail project on October 4 and 5. The Metro project may provide a fast ride when it finally comes up but this may be at[Read More…]
It is not just the arrogant, rich and drunken drivers who cause road crashes . Even professors in IITs, the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology, tend to drive or tended to drive rashly within the campus injuring students. Dinesh Mohan, professor from IIT Delhi and the country’s foremost expert on road crashes, points out that when speed breakers were put[Read More…]
Is then no nook of English ground free from rash assault , asked the famous English poet William Wordsworth more than 170 years ago. He was responding to the threat posed by the so-called development to Nature in his beloved lake district. Since then the threat to the environment has increased manifold in different parts of the world. One would[Read More…]
Indore city deserves to be in the news for better reasons than the ugly bat wielding by the spoilt son of BJP general secretary Kailas Vijayavargiya last week. I was in Indore last week for a workshop on sustainable transport. The city is astonishingly clean and deserves the first ranking in cleanliness in the country. Mumbai, which is in such[Read More…]
If our urban transport crisis is getting worse it is not difficult to see why. Look what is happening in Varanasi town in Prime Minister Modi’s constituency. A move is a foot at a high level to introduce ropeways in the ancient town in collaboration with an Austrian company. An absurdly expensive and technologically inappropriate solution when all you need[Read More…]
It is time Mumbai’s new municipal commissioner Pravin Pardeshi convenes a meeting of citizens to discuss ways to take the city out of the mess it has landed in. This was the view at a meeting of citizens including structural engineers, architects, planners and activists at Moneylife Foundation in Dadar. The point made by prominent structural engineer Alpa Sheth that[Read More…]
With the harsh political reality we are now faced with there is a serious need for strong resistance from citizens. This was clear at a public hearing on the proposed Metro rail line 6 project in Mumbai on May 21. Alert citizens, architects, engineers, housewives, transport experts completely exposed the inefficiency and insensitivity in the implementation of the project [Read More…]
The rulers went out of their way to bring pressure on public sector banks to bail out the unprofessionally run private airline Jet Airways. This put at risk thousands of crores of public funds. There are double standards here. On the one hand the glamorous airline industry is pampered and on the other hand the BEST bus undertaking serving millions[Read More…]
As we celebrateDr Babasaheb Ambedkar’s birth anniversary, we need to imbibe his important motto- Educate, Organise. Agitate. As Karl Marx said philosophers have interpreted the world in different ways. The point is to change it. This is the most important heritage of Dr Ambedkar, changing the world. One of the great advantages of Dr Ambedkar’s teachings was the tremendous awakening[Read More…]
Mumbai:With the collapse of transport infrastructure for common people in Mumbai making big headlines daily, any self -respecting administration would have felt embarrassed and concentrated on basic amenities and suspended or postponed fancy schemes like the bullet train or the coastal road for cars. More so when we are now amidst elections. But far from it. The authorities show little[Read More…]
Infrastructure is the catchword of our politicians and bureaucrats. But they are obsessed with creating infrastructure for the upper class, not for common people. The pedestrian bridge collapse in Mumbai last Thursday killing six people and injuring several others underscores the extremely anti-people nature of the Indian State. But it is not likely to learn any lessons unless massive public[Read More…]
True, the deaths of soldiers have to be lamented. But the Indian authorities’ record is extremely incompetent when it comes to the deaths of innocents in other fields. There is evidence of jingoism when it comes to the deaths of soldiers but on the other hand and utter callousness on the other. Many more people are killed on Indian roads[Read More…]
The Maharashtra government and the municipal corporation in Mumbai have starved and crippled India’s once premier bus service BEST and now there is a move to further humiliate the bus service and its users. A Shiv Sena corporator has proposed to the civic body that old BEST buses be used as mobile toilets ostensibly for use of commuters caught in[Read More…]
Mumbai: Mr Nitin Gadkari, union road transport minister, is one of the more efficient ministers. He often comes up with innovative solutions like converting waste water and garbage to profitable use. Unfortunately, there is little innovation in urban transport with which his department is closely concerned. In fact, instead of innovation, regressive , costly solutions are being thrust on civic[Read More…]
“It is no doubt ironic that the motor car, superstar of the capitalist system, expects to live rent-free” – WOLFGANG ZUCKERMAN. It is true even very rich motorists all over the world do not like to pay for parking. That is bad enough. What is alarming is that in India this insistence on the right to park free, grab public[Read More…]
During a recent visit to the ancient Karnak temple complex in Egypt, I overheard a lady saying Mr Trump should be here. She was suggesting that looking at these gigantic monuments, the U.S. president would realise how small he really is and that the ancient ruins should teach him a lesson. It turned out that the lady was a Parsi.[Read More…]
In Delhi authorities seem to have at least some understanding of the need for promoting public transport and to discourage private cars. This seems to be sorely lacking in Mumbai. Air pollution is now so bad in Delhi that the chief of the Environment Pollution Control Authority, senior administrator, Bhure Lal, warned that from November 1 the authority may have[Read More…]
This year marks the 70th anniversary of the exemplary National Health Service of Britain which is important for us in India because NHS gives the right to good health and treatment to citizens. No society can call itself civilized if a sick person is denied medical aid because of lack of means , declared Aneurin Bevan, Britain’s health minister from[Read More…]
The famed Urdu poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz once wrote about the plight of ordinary people who must walk, eyes lowered, the body crouched in fear due to the onslaught of dictatorship(.nisaar mai.n terii galiyo.n ke ae watan is the opening line of the original poem). Faiz wrote in a different context but people in Mumbai now walk with more dread[Read More…]
The Hindutva forces now expect every one to fall in line with their thinking. But they will not succeed. This reminds me of a play Rhinoceros written by Eugene Ionesco, a French-Romanian, a major playwright in the tradition of the theatre of the Absurd In this play over a period , every one turns from a human being into a[Read More…]
The well planned digging of the footpath by supporters of Raj Thackeray outside Mantralaya shows the deeply anti-people nature of a section of the political class. Simply because the attack was not directed against human beings does not make it less sinister than recent lynchings and the assault on Swami Agnivesh. Thackeray loves expensive and fast cars and a good[Read More…]
After walking on Bangalore’s or Benguluru’s fashionable M.G. road earlier this week I casually hopped into a bus at Anil Kumble circle named after the former Indian cricket captain. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the fare was only Rs. 5 for Shivaji Nagar bus station. A distance of a little less than a km. but still the[Read More…]
If Mrs Indira Gandhi had listened to Mr P.N. Haksar, her reputed principal secretary, India probably would not have landed in the mess in the automobile and public transport sector. Mr Haksar, a staunch socialist, strongly opposed her son Sanjay Gandhi’s arrogant and ill-conceived Maruti car project and this paved the way for his exit as principal secretary in 1973[Read More…]
Mr Mohan Bhagwat,RSS chief in his speech preceding Pranab Mukherjee’s in the RSS headquarters made a reference which seems very questionable but has attracted little notice.In quoting a Sanskrit subhashit, a saying, he virtually ridiculed intellectual debate. Those who use learning for debate are wicked., he said. This was in keeping with the current dumbing down of knowledge and[Read More…]
Kiran Nagarkar, well-known novelist, floated the idea during his recent interaction with activists that some kind of a rasta roko agitation could be held to check the growing congestion caused by cars, to assert people’s right to the road and to help increase the speed of BEST buses. The car lobby , the traffic police and the whole establishment will[Read More…]
Imagine losing dear, tender teenage daughters in violence and still seeking not revenge but fighting for a new society built on justice and seeking peace. It was inspiring to listen to two peace activists, an Israeli and a Palestinian , in Mumbai last Sunday talk about how they have come to terms with their personal grief. Rami Elhanan’s daughter Smaddar,[Read More…]
When it comes to plundering of public spaces for the benefit the builder lobby, there is not much to choose in Mahrashtra between the Shiv Sena-BJP combine or the Congress parties. In the year 2005 during the Congress rule, Ganesh Naik, environment and forest minister, openly talked of the need to sell public spaces. That these were very scarce in[Read More…]
The spectacular red flag , disciplined march of farmers spearheaded by the kisan wing of the Communist party of India (M), and other Left organizations in Maharashtra has galvanized public opinion. The week-long march which reached Mumbai on March 12 is a great morale booster for the Left. The images of sore feet of women and men trudging nearly 180[Read More…]
This beats even Hema Malini’s absurd observation in the wake of the fire in the Kamala mill compound in Mumbai last December in which 14 people mainly from affluent families were killed. She blamed it on the influx of people from outside for the city’s problems. That was bad enough for a BJP MP and popular film actor. But at[Read More…]
One can understand the BJP suppressing the involvement of its drunken leader in the killing of nine school children and injuring 20 other children in broad daylight in Bihar last week. But why did a large section of the media join in suppressing the news while it gave saturation coverage to the death of film star Sridevi ?. We are[Read More…]
Pity the rich, wrote American popular comedian Will Durst recently in a satirical vein. They face too many problems. No body robs the poor but the rich are always afraid of robbers. But actually the rich rob the poor. He then went on to refer to the rich as open cancer sores on the face of society. One was reminded[Read More…]
This luxury 24 storey high rise building represents an assault on the heart of Mumbai. This is in Mahim geographically the heart of the metropolis as Mahim connects the island city with the suburbs. The skyscraper is an eyesore amidst low-rise housing but more than that it has come up on the bus depot of the BEST Undertaking .[Read More…]
I was impressed by the pleasant ambience of the Trivandrum railway station and the bus depot for long distance travel which is just across the road. This is how public transport should be but this has become so rare due to the callousness of our politicians and bureaucrats. The whole area is clean. And travel is really seamless. I[Read More…]
Vineeta Bal, a former member of the Prime Minister’s task force for science, narrated a humorous poem by the Marathi poet Sopandev Chaudhari last week to underscore the importance of scientific temper. The poem points out that Newton could think of the law of gravity when he saw the apple fall to the ground while some of us can[Read More…]
Some times creative writers give insighs into problems better than experts. During the wave of the Theatre of the Absurd Achyut Vaze wrote a play in the 1970s in which the characters wait for a bus which never arrives like Godot in Beckett’s famous play Waiting for Godot. One is reminded of Vaze’s play Chal Re Bhopalya by the[Read More…]
One can understand the annoyance Maharashtra’s director general of police Satish Mathur faced last Monday when he was stuck in traffic for half an hour in the central business district CBD Belapur. Four policemen were transferred for failing not to clear the way for him. Mr Mathur would feel much less annoyed if he realized that his discomfort is nothing[Read More…]
Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis’s announcement last week to set up an urban arts commission for Mumbai is well intentioned. But it comes at an odd time. Several leaders of his party, the BJP, at the national level have shown little respect for some of the finest monuments of the country and now party MLA Sangeet Som calls the Taj[Read More…]
The implications of the stampede which killed 23 people and injured 39 at Elphinstone road railway station in Mumbai on September 29, are larger than we have seen so far. I visited the station and surrounding area three days in the last one week and noticed that the treatment of commuters is far more inhuman than we thought. Two[Read More…]
I saw an interesting French comedy film Boss’s Daughter recently. It was also remarkable because of the intelligent use of the concept of ergonomics which involves right use of technology for the human body at the workplace, home or travel. In his film the boss’s daughter uses the science of ergonomics to see how work in her father’s factory is[Read More…]
Considering its huge budget, it is perhaps not surprising that there has been so much orchestrated praise in the media for the film Bahubali 2 with its record box office collections. It is disturbing enough but more questionable is the RSS mouthpiece Panchjanya championing the film as an ideal expression of Hindu values . One can give any spin[Read More…]
Beijing, the Chinese capital could well be a model for India’s Swachh Bharat mission of cleanliness. Toilets are everywhere in the city, I noticed during my two-week visit to Beijing last month. It could also be a model for us in public transport. I experienced this through my constant walks in different parts of the city and travel by[Read More…]
All media focus currently is on whether the BJP or the Shiv Sena will have its Mayor in Mumbai following a hung house after the recent civic election. Real issues usually remain buried, unexplored. Look at the neglect of public spaces despite the increasingly poisonous air . Mumbai city’s deterioration can be understood in the context of the concern[Read More…]
One has to be really affluent or be in rich surroundings to walk with ease in India, it seems. I was in a very upmarket gated colony of bungalows in Bangalore last week. There were footpaths on both sides, lined with palm trees, there was little traffic and one could enjoy the walking. This is a highly protected environment. The[Read More…]
The money crisis is more painful because of is suddenness. But the government has been causing hardships to citizens for years through various ways. One is the anti-people policy on transport. The pain is spread over a long time and we do not feel it so intensely. The government has inflicted motorization on the country without any safeguards to vulnerable[Read More…]
Gandhinagar, 13 November, 2016: This turned out to be quite a travesty of Mahatma Gandhi and his teachings in the land of his birth. This was in Gandhinagar, the capital of Gujarat . The occasion was the inauguration of an official government of India conference on urban transport on November 8 but the inauguration proved to be a well-planned[Read More…]
Mumbai: Despite advances in technology, life is getting worse for users of public transport . This is at least partly because of the callous way the technology is being handled. The seats in the big brand new coaches in the local Western railway trains in Mumbai are clearly uncomfortable. I tried out both in first and second class. I[Read More…]
The Maharashtra government is back to its policy of privatizing open public spaces in Mumbai. Ordinary people are the losers because of this policy declared on July 27. . The upper class is not bothered because it has created its own spaces for recreation when it is not grabbing public space. I got a glimpse recently when I attended a[Read More…]
Bombay Gymkhana Mumbai: The 140-year-old Bombay Gymkhana asserted its elite and exclusive character earlier this month. It voted after much debate not to admit senior government officers as members. But then how come this class, so keen to preserve its privilege , has for years so openly intruded upon public space just outside its premises for almost 20 years ?.[Read More…]
Mumbai: A man murdered a woman in Mumbai recently because he was afraid she was going to deprive him of his job as a temporary watchman. This shows the crisis of employment in Mumbai. And this is a city which among all places in India is supposed to provide the maximum employment opportunity. And the watchman security industry is one[Read More…]
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Our beloved K.P.Sasi is no more. Filmmaker, cartoonist, writer, mentor, friend and above all tireless activist championing the cause of every underdog, Sasi breathed his last, mid-afternoon this Christmas day – after battling a medical condition for months. I remember the last time I met him, almost exactly a month before he passed away, at the ayurvedic healing center in[Read More…]
