Footpath Users' Travails

Hi, we use footpaths when we have to travel a short distance or if it helps us reach our destination in a shorter time, than take a vehicle and get caught in slow moving traffic or circuitous u-turns. However, exercising that option is not for the faint-hearted, as it often turns out to be as treacherous as treading a minefield.

Decently maintained footpaths in Bangalore have become as rare as sparrows and even on arterial roads they are in bad shape. Recently when the German Consulate in the city was planning to hold Indo–German Urban Mela, it had to plead with the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike to fix the roads and footpath near the consulate building!

The slabs on most pavements are often not properly fixed, but they look deceptively firm and you realise their true state only when you step on them. Your heart misses many beats, while left dangling.

At some places the slabs are missing and you have to use your athletic skills to dart over them. A glimpse at the view below will make your stomach churn. It’s one of those tell tale repositories of our collective abdication of civic sense.

Dodging litter is another big challenge. It ranges from household waste in polythene bags to what remains of morning ablution carried out by cattle and pooches (from strays to pure breeds residing in gated communities). Quite often one has to take a chance of stepping on the road, and risk their limbs, to make way for cows relieving on footpaths, quite unmindful of the surroundings. Even more unmindful are men who treat footpaths as open air urinals. This malaise cuts across social status, caste and economic boundaries.

Near traffic junctions and markets the hapless pedestrian gets elbowed out by cobblers, vegetable and other vendors. With barely a space to have a toehold over footpath, many get down to the road and this only adds to the congestion on the roads. At some places we have power transformers taking a Lion’s share.

And lastly, during the rush hours of morning and evening, pedestrians are often subjected to the deadliest challenge. They have to contend with footpath bikers, trying to beat the traffic pile ups near various signals. They use footpaths to dart past the bumper to bumper traffic  – and let pedestrians be damned.

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Trash At The Doorstep

Like any other Indian city Bangalore too has a primitive landfill method of disposing its waste, something it inherited probably from British Raj days. Then the city was a fraction of what it is now, both in terms of size and population. Little reforms or innovation have happened in this sector ever since.

I guess this has to do with the deep rooted caste system in the country, where jobs such as cleaning the streets, toilets and surrounding are looked down upon. Though the city transformed itself from pensioner's paradise to silicon valley, there has been hardly any change in the way the employees of this particular sector function.

The civic employees (or pourakarmikas) still use the same old broom and have to rely on bare hands to collect the waste. Moreover, it goes without saying that their pay and other service conditions are abysmal.

Until recently it was a heart wrenching sight to see some of the male civic workers, clad in loin clothes, descend into manholes to clear blocks. Thankfully after long drawn legal battles, we now see BBMP's Jetter machines carrying out the task. However since they are mounted on trucks, they do cause traffic snarls when they are at work in narrow bylanes. But this is a small price to pay to relieve the civic workers of their misery.

The mindset of city residents towards waste and its disposal is no way different from the rest of Indian public. As long as it does not prove an eyesore  or hit his nostrils, it is out of mind. This idyll, resting solely on complacency, came crashing nearly two and half months ago, when the civic workers went on strike as they had not got their salaries for three months. The problem got confounded when people staying near the landfills too rose in protest. They said their health and well being was being affected by incessant dumping of city's trash.

In the resulting standoff the city's street corners got dotted with ugly mounds of garbage, much to the delight of stray dogs, cattle and of course rats. They were not only eyesores and nausea inducing, but the city also witnessed an alarming rise in the number of dengue cases.

However, its not that the city fathers never thought of processing the waste. They made a half hearted effort by entrusting Ramky Infrastructure Ltd to set up a waste treatment plant at Mavallipura.

But things did not happen as planned. Ramky contends it was promised 100 acres land, but could get around half of it as 46 acres was under litigation. Hence they are able to process only 20% of waste and were not able to set up the proposed plant to generate power out of waste. But villagers allege that there is an unholy nexus between Ramky and BBMP officials and hardly any waste gets processed.

Another dimension to this problem is that due to the rising population and real estate pressures the buffer zone between the landfills and human habitations have thinned down. It used to be 1 kilometre, but now it is 100 metres.

Then BBMP came up with segregation at source mantra. Considering the kind of ‘civic sense’ a Bangalorean, or for that matter an Indian has, it was like expecting  juvenile home inmates to follow Sunday school teaching. Though the BBMP has rolled out the scheme, the response has been far from encouraging, barring few pockets.

Lots of questions remain. What constitutes a dry waste and wet waste is something many are still not clear about. Though BBMP has post haste brought in the segregation rule, it has done little to set up dry waste treatment plants.

The scenario in my area is that pourakarmikas have stopped taking waste from houses and it is being dumped at street corners. And newer mounds of garbage seem to be emerging and a lasting solution seems nowhere in sight.

The current rainy spell due to cyclone Nilam on Chennai coast is only making matters worse.

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What Ails Suburban Stations

I happened to go to Banaswadi railway station to see off my family and got a taste of what actually ails the city's suburban stations, especially those on the way to Yeshwanthpur. 

Though these stations figure among the designated stops of various express trains, to reduce pressure on Bangalore Central and Yeshwantpur stations, hardly any thought or action has taken place to improve amenities. The length of the platform in many of these stations are still good enough only for local trains and hence when a 18-coach express train arrives, some of the rear coaches don't make it to the platform.

We started from home early, not because we had any illusions about Railway's punctuality, but to circumvent the greatest bugbear of Bangaloreans - traffic. Surprisingly it was not in its element, partly because it happened to be a Sunday, and we ended up reaching the station about 45 minutes ahead of scheduled time.

As it was drizzling we decided to spend some time in the car. Later about 15 minutes ahead of the scheduled time we made it to the station. The usually sleepy entrance was bursting at the seams. I rationalised that it might be due to the festival rush, as most schools are closed for nearly a fortnight.

Somehow we managed to negotiate our way amid the crowds and baggage into the platform. Only then it did dawn on me the real reason for this crowding. The platform roof barely covers a small area near the entrance of the station. The rest of them have been left open. Since it was drizzling, passengers had decided to remain huddled below the roof area.

A stray dog, probably a long time resident at the station, was bewildered by the crowd and had to put up with the agony of being stepped upon or shooed away by passengers. The dog too was also seeking its place under the roof to avoid getting drenched. 

I then realised that the second platform had no roof at all. Shortly afterwards a train arrived in that platform. It was coming from Tirupati and had lots of pilgrims with shaven heads. Don't know how passengers alighting from that train managed amid the drizzle. And those who stayed back for onward journey were subjected to long torturous wait. In fact it left only after the Kannur bound express left, after about 45 minutes.

The reason, of course, again lies with lack of planning. Though Yeshwanthpur was made an alternate terminus to Bangalore Central, no measures were taken to double the track. Nearly 20-30 trains originate from the terminus but they have to make do with single track. As a result, we have these eternal waits due to crossings. Quite often trains even start off from Yeshwantpur on a delayed note.

Finally our train arrived, of course some 45 minutes behind schedule, but mercifully the rains had stopped and the crowd had dispersed. 

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Biotech for Cleaner Lakes

Bangalore's 'pensioner's paradise' tag got buried under the numerous steel and glass structures, traffic gridlocks and dwindling tree cover and the city acquired a new avatar of being India's very own silicon valley. Software movers and shakers such as NR Narayana Murthy and Azim Premji became household names.

However the biotechnology sector, though quite active in the city, somehow got eclipsed and could not come out of the shadows of IT sector. For those not studying biotechnology, their familiarity with the sector begins and ends with Biocon and its chief Kiran Mazumdar Shaw.

Ever heard of Nualgi Nano Biotech (NNB)? A chance encounter on NDTV site about this company made me sit up and watch. This Jayanagar-based biotech firm is helping Americans clean up their polluted lakes.

The news item describes NNB as 'a low profile biotech company' founded by Thothathri Sampathkumar and has cleared a 3-acre lake of weeds and algae and helped boost fish population. All it needed was 50 kg of Nualgi - a product invented and patented by the company.

The company's promoters describe Nualgi as a mix of micro nutrients in the form of nano particles including silica, iron and manganese, which triggers the rapid growth of a type of algae called diatoms (never mind the technical details and read on). The diatoms release oxygen through photosynthesis and it increases the dissolved oxygen level in water and thus keeps the pond clean. Diatoms converted into 'zooplanktons' provide food for the fish. One kilogram of Nualgi can treat four million litres of water!

To me it sounded too good to be true and as I was reading through the article numerous images and even smells of filthy lakes and rivers of our country came to my mind. I must confess that the Cooum river of Chennai and Bandra creek of Mumbai took the prime time space in my mind. It really beats me as to why their expertise was not used here in a big way.

Towards the end of the article it mentioned that in India it has been used in some lakes, mainly by fishermen to increase their catch. A Google search revealed that some of the Bangalore lakes treated with nualgi include Madivala Lake, Ulsoor Lake, Vengayyana Kere (KR Puram) and Puttenahalli Lake. Sadly only one press article I came across and that too by a financial newspaper The Mint in 2009. Nobody from the mainstream press seems to have woken up to it.

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Rumour Is the Key

The country was basking in the glory of Mary Kom's exploits at the Olympics and sports writers, columnists and TV anchors were taking us on guilt trips as to how we have neglected the northeast.

Then came the Independence Day and on that languid evening I first heard that the security guard of our office has 'fled' and people from northeast were fleeing the city fearing violence. To me it sounded as bizarre as saying that Martians have taken over Public Utility building and may soon invade Bangalore.

The guard mind you was a Bihari, but his family was settled in Assam. He no way had facial features like a person from northeast and his Hindi was chaste as those from the cow belt. At first I thought he had cooked up some funny story to bunk office.

Later on TV channels started airing footages of Bangalore city railway station, which resembled Mumbai VT during the beginning of school vacations. The fact that it happened on an Independence Day evoked memories of those infamous train journeys that happened during the 1947 partition. It left me wondering what was compelling these people to take a chance by travelling ‘sardine’ class for 50-plus hours to reach their hometowns. And I shudder to think as to what shape they are going to be after they reach their destination.

Assurances from state home minister, police officials and others did little to convince them. The state leaders, of course, have a very poor track record in protecting the lives and properties of minorities, hence they carry little conviction. But what actually surprised me was that the state currently has a police chief,  who hails from Mizoram, and even his words inspired little confidence.  

The exodus seems to be cutting across all class lines. As described earlier about that Bihari-Assamese guy, people from every state of northeast, cutting across religion, ethnic and economic strata seemed to be hopping on to the exodus bandwagon. Janitors, restaurant workers, hair stylists, students, techies and BPO employees all seem to have sensed some major unseen calamity was about to befall them if they remained in the city.

For the first time the ethnic strife in Assam between Bodos and Bangladeshi Muslims seem to having fallout in other parts of India. So far all ethnic strife in northeast were very localized events and drew little coverage in the national media. It first began with a protest rally called by a Muslim fringe group in Mumbai turning violent. There were some recent attacks on northeast origin people in Pune and later on a Tibetan in Mysore. These attacks also revealed the opaque perceptions the people from 'mainland' have regarding the communities in northeast.

But somehow all that no way provides answers to Bangalore exodus. Reports of threatening text messages, social networking site messages and inflammatory posters in the city seems to have more than succeeded in triggering this panic. There have been some incidents of stone throwing etc on the city outskirts. The most common rumour doing rounds is that Muslims in the city are waiting for Id to get over to carry out reprisal attacks on people from northeast. Another rumour is that of an inflammatory video on Assam violence is being circulated to incite Muslims. Many among those who were fleeing told newspapers that their parents back home in Assam want them back as they fear attacks in Bangalore. So it looks like there was rumour mongering in Assam also.

Who is behind all these rumours? How they are managing to get the numbers of northeast residents in the city to bombard them with threatening text messages? Why others are not getting these messages? These are early days to get answers to these questions, but needs to be thoroughly investigated. Another scary aspect is that this kind of selective targeting can in future happen with other communities.

When I came to Bangalore six years back what I found very striking was the presence of people from northeast in the city. I guess it was quite a new phenomenon, as during my earlier visit to the city in the nineties, I hardly came across anyone from that region. These new developments seem to be pushing the clock back. I am hoping this is a passing phase and the people who have fled the city will come back.

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