Thursday, March 30, 2006
Are we ready for development?
Recently in the Economist magazine, several articles about India talked about India’s growth, India’s potential for growth, India’s future development, India compared to China – you get the picture. However, several readers responded with criticisms, not about the statistics or the reporting, but that India is not ready for development.
The criticisms all revolve around one issue – India’s astounding lack of public hygiene and civic responsibility. One reader commented about the filth and the stench emanating from the public bathroom in the Chattrapathi Shivaji railway station in India – but why go so far, and why go to a train station. The same is true about the bathrooms in Bangalore airport – the airport that hosts the world’s elite, the brains of hi-tech city, the high-ranking politicians, the businessmen and everyday people. One of my friends said that in spite of a delicate balancing act of holding her nose and trying to use the facilities, she had to bite down on her tongue to stop a gagging reflex that she had to the odors. Tourists have to plan their tours and shopping to ensure that they return to their hotels for bathroom breaks. Students often hold it until they return home. People who have no choice bear the risk of communicable diseases. Are these our only options? Is there no solution in light of our burgeoning economy and prophecies of development?
Why is the country that invented the zero, that has such pride in cleanliness of the home, that is renowned for its hospitality, one of the dirtiest, filthiest countries in the world? As Edward R. Murrow, a famous television journalist in the United States said, “we must not confuse dissent with disloyalty.” The problem is serious. There are a billion plus people living in the country. Urban spaces are packed and continue to grow. The current infrastructure is unable to keep up with the pace of growth and is often groaning under the burden of serving twice or thrice the intended population. The problem is connected to other social issues and from a macro level, seems impossible to solve.
Most people think it is below their dignity to clean up after themselves in public places, that it is the duty of lower caste members, bathroom and sewer cleaners to do so. Why do Indians lack pride in their city? I’m not even addressing the problems created by those that don’t have a home, those that sleep on the street – that is another issue altogether. I’m addressing this to educated, middle-class and rich Indians who don’t think twice before littering in public or dump their trash outside their home, in an empty, neighboring lot.
This does not happen in the U.S. People comment that Indians in the U.S. behave differently in India than in the U.S., but why is that accepted, even if it is true? Do non-resident Indians somehow develop a magical sense of community and responsibility? My argument is that people follow by example and learn by the disapproving glances of those around them if they commit a civic crime.
Some Indians would probably say that this is a typical NRI mindset – to criticize India and all things Indian. Maybe we are used to something different, something better. It is not wrong to want the same kind of development in the cities we grew up in. The problems still exist, in fact they are growing by the minute and the repercussions are great. Communicable diseases spread faster and take their toll on the weak. How many people know that jaundice, a serious liver disease, is caused by food or water that is infected with human excrement?
Surat reportedly cleaned up after the plague and is supposedly one of the cleanest cities in the country. What is it going to take to wake up a sleeping population regarding the ills of their surroundings? A plague?
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