WHO WILL SAVE DELHI FROM DELHIITES?
WHO WILL SAVE DELHI FROM DELHIITES….
by rchopra53
Everyone in Delhi is in a rage. Fights including fisticuffs and worse break out at the drop of a hat. There is road rage, where people fly off the handle at being overtaken by another vehicle on the road or at not being allowed to overtake. There is line rage, where people standing in a queue break out into a fight because someone wants to jump the line. Actually standing in line is so passé in Delhi because if you are really a VVIP what are you doing standing in a queue.
Then there is parking rage. We fight over parking slots in the market, in the street where we live, the place we go visiting. People die because of parking rage. So, if you are visiting someone in another colony, you fend for yourself. For parking purposes you are from Pakistan. Additionally, there is an unwritten law that the street next to your boundary wall is your slot for parking. So you fight against intruders. All new construction in Delhi is on stilts to create parking slots on the ground floor. But trying to get the last vehicle out of the parking area can be gruesome. So you park on the street. The government has constructed some multi level parking slots in markets. But they are such a drag. No one wants to use them. So we park on the road and the Police have no issue with that. Of course we have the highest number of cars in India but that is another story.
But the rage story continues. There is rape, the ultimate rage against women. We are, by miles, the nation’s rape capital. There is rage because of inadequate dowry and dowry deaths. Tihar jail has a separate wing for mothers in law doing time on dowry deaths. Delhi reports a whopping 15% of the nation’s crimes against women. There is commuting rage. In the metro and buses, heated arguments over seats are a common occurrence. The crowning glory is that we have rage against policemen, who are now being thrashed, run over and humiliated.
There are areas in Delhi where the beat constable does not venture. Police hours are long, there are no regular offs, alcoholism is an issue, and suicides are an issue. Delhi Police morale at the lower rung is low and it does not seem to bother people who matter. In short, as a consequence or otherwise, everyone in Delhi seems to be moving around with the proverbial hand on the holster, itching to draw and shoot.
It’s not as if it does not happen elsewhere in the country. It is just that it appears to happen here with greater intensity and frequency. And as if to prove the point beyond discussion, what better way than to resort to the cliche that a place gets the government it deserves. We have a CM elected by a whopping majority, who appears on TV every other day, very, very angry. He is almost frothing at the mouth, nostrils flaring, railing against, Modi, the Central government, the Delhi Police, the babus he commands, the electricity distributing companies, the Delhi Jal Board and anyone else you may want to include.
It is tempting to slip into a dismemberment of the AAP psyche but that is for greater minds. What is of relevance here is why Delhi is so quick on the draw? Compare that with the success of the odd even experiment, where Delhi cooperated so well or even during the Commonwealth Games when one lane of the road was parcelled off for athlete carrying vehicles. If there is a paradox, it is maybe explained by the distinct possibility that the average law bending Delhiite is generally a bully, who will first threaten, then whine and finally negotiate. This kind of theory sits well with the crimes against women, typical acts of a bully against weaker opponents. It sits well with the negotiations and whining that goes on with the traffic police when they are on their challan spree. It sits well with the jugaad to avoid red tape through connections and wheeling dealing so integral to Delhi’s lifestyle, from the lowly transport department, the police check post to the musty corridors of the South Block and the North Block.
And then there is the Delhi Police. If the AAP government has any valid issue on which to pick a grouse with the central government, it is this absolute apathy of the establishment towards the average Delhi citizen that shrieks the loudest. Some statistics would help to enable a better perspective. Heinous crimes increased by 157% from 3268 to 8403 in one year from 2013 to 2014. Attempted murder was up by 36%, rape by 37% (1693/yr), burglary up by 239%, robbery up by 429%. Every day, the newspapers are filled with items on rapes, murders; carjacking, shoot outs, chain snatching and what have you. By any standards that is huge. We have the land mafia here, the real estate mafia, the hospital admission mafia, the school admission mafia, the parking lot mafia, you name it we have it. From time to time these mafias clash and shoot outs occur, all part of our daily existence
But what is bigger is the silence of the media about it, which is deafening. Compare that with the hue and cry about the law and order in UP and Bihar. To say that the Delhi Police concentrates more on VVIPs would not be an understatement. So while the Delhi police have 78,000 on its strength, 20,000 and more look after VVIP duties. Another tit bit, while during UPA, 332 VVIPs got special protection this number has jumped to 454 under the NDA government. The sad part is that while the media has created a perception of the Wild West about the two states of UP and Bihar, it is shockingly indifferent about what is going on in Delhi. Or maybe no one cares. But there is another aspect. Delhi has one of the higher if not the highest per ca-pita incomes along with a high literacy rate. And yet the populace is not able to bring this aspect of lawlessness to centre stage. But there is more to ponder about this contradiction.
85% of Delhi GSDP comes from the services sector and the rest from industry. This has led to generation of highly vulnerable low paid and informal jobs. So there are shop workers, construction workers, transportation sector workers, maids, cooks, security personnel, street vendors, delivery people, repair mechanics and thus form 86% of workers in the city. The annual increase in population is more from immigration than from natural growth. 30% of the population is now from Bihar and Eastern UP. Sheila Dixit and Vijay Goel initially voiced their concerns but now that Bhojpuri actor who sings his way through interviews, is the face of the Delhi politician, always missing in action and appearing once in a while to give sound bites.
Delhi has a land mass of 1500 sq kms and a population of 1.7 crores and more at last reckoning. At more than 11, 000 persons per sq km, it has a very high population density. Delhi also has a huge soft underbelly. 50% of the population lives in slums and only 25% in planned areas. The population density in the North East part of the city is three times the city’s density, ie, about 33,000 persons/sq km. 22% of the slums in Delhi are using Open Defecation and 55% are using community toilets that are very unhygienic. Is the PMO looking under its nose for the Swacch Bharat campaign? Of course not.
There are multiple agencies running or destroying Delhi, take your pick. There are three local municipal bodies, the NDMC, the Municipal Corporations and the Delhi Cantonment Board. The NDMC looks after the part of Delhi where the Central government and its paraphernalia reside. Of course it is a different world from the rest of Delhi. It is green; it has wide roads, phenomenal police presence, CCTV cameras and what have you. As if to further sharpen the divide, this part of Delhi alone is part of the Smart city plans. At this rate, Delhiites may soon need visas to enter NDMC areas. Then there is the DDA under the Central government, the final arbiter of land allotment in the Capital and rumoured to be a hotbed of corruption. The Delhi police is also under the central government and answerable to no one but a babu in the Home Ministry who is answerable to no one in turn. In short, Delhi is running on auto pilot because when everyone is responsible, no one is responsible.
And that is Delhi’s tragedy. No one belongs to Delhi and Delhi belongs to no one. The Central government and its paraphernalia are in the golden part of the city. Excuse them. The AAP government has total control over aspects like education and health and transport and tourism but can get no land for any of its schemes because that is under the central government. It also has distinct pan India aspirations so most of its energy is spent on telling anyone who will listen how they cannot work but if allowed they can do wonders. So right now they are trying to set the system right. Till then excuse them too.
Then there are the Municipal corporations that are responsible for the civic amenities. They are run by the BJP and so are daggers drawn with the AAP. They get their monies from the AAP government, so the AAP is doing to them what the central government is doing to AAP. As a result, the average Delhiite can shout till he is blue in the face but he is caught in the middle with nowhere to go.
What compounds the problem is the fact that Delhi is the mother of melting pots. From the fading politician to the faded (retired) babu looking for moments under the sun, to the job seeker, to the sustenance seeker, everyone settles down in Delhi, no one belongs here. Unlike in the other metros there is no indigenous population here, only seniority in domicile. The Marathi manoos has the Shiv Sena articulating his angst, the Kannadiga movement gets strong in Bengaluru, Bengalis are overwhelming in Kolkata but Delhi has no binding element to exploit to express its frustration at what it is going through. The Nirbhaya movement and the Anna movement were glorious exceptions but there has been little else of note. Day to day existence is a battle for survival fought alone and with no one watching your back.
And so while the gladiators like AAP and the BJP slug it out over the decaying and overflowing landfills of Delhi, the average Delhiite thanks his stars if he can wrangle his existence and live to fight another day, literally and metaphorically. more
by rchopra53
Everyone in Delhi is in a rage. Fights including fisticuffs and worse break out at the drop of a hat. There is road rage, where people fly off the handle at being overtaken by another vehicle on the road or at not being allowed to overtake. There is line rage, where people standing in a queue break out into a fight because someone wants to jump the line. Actually standing in line is so passé in Delhi because if you are really a VVIP what are you doing standing in a queue.
Then there is parking rage. We fight over parking slots in the market, in the street where we live, the place we go visiting. People die because of parking rage. So, if you are visiting someone in another colony, you fend for yourself. For parking purposes you are from Pakistan. Additionally, there is an unwritten law that the street next to your boundary wall is your slot for parking. So you fight against intruders. All new construction in Delhi is on stilts to create parking slots on the ground floor. But trying to get the last vehicle out of the parking area can be gruesome. So you park on the street. The government has constructed some multi level parking slots in markets. But they are such a drag. No one wants to use them. So we park on the road and the Police have no issue with that. Of course we have the highest number of cars in India but that is another story.
But the rage story continues. There is rape, the ultimate rage against women. We are, by miles, the nation’s rape capital. There is rage because of inadequate dowry and dowry deaths. Tihar jail has a separate wing for mothers in law doing time on dowry deaths. Delhi reports a whopping 15% of the nation’s crimes against women. There is commuting rage. In the metro and buses, heated arguments over seats are a common occurrence. The crowning glory is that we have rage against policemen, who are now being thrashed, run over and humiliated.
There are areas in Delhi where the beat constable does not venture. Police hours are long, there are no regular offs, alcoholism is an issue, and suicides are an issue. Delhi Police morale at the lower rung is low and it does not seem to bother people who matter. In short, as a consequence or otherwise, everyone in Delhi seems to be moving around with the proverbial hand on the holster, itching to draw and shoot.
It’s not as if it does not happen elsewhere in the country. It is just that it appears to happen here with greater intensity and frequency. And as if to prove the point beyond discussion, what better way than to resort to the cliche that a place gets the government it deserves. We have a CM elected by a whopping majority, who appears on TV every other day, very, very angry. He is almost frothing at the mouth, nostrils flaring, railing against, Modi, the Central government, the Delhi Police, the babus he commands, the electricity distributing companies, the Delhi Jal Board and anyone else you may want to include.
It is tempting to slip into a dismemberment of the AAP psyche but that is for greater minds. What is of relevance here is why Delhi is so quick on the draw? Compare that with the success of the odd even experiment, where Delhi cooperated so well or even during the Commonwealth Games when one lane of the road was parcelled off for athlete carrying vehicles. If there is a paradox, it is maybe explained by the distinct possibility that the average law bending Delhiite is generally a bully, who will first threaten, then whine and finally negotiate. This kind of theory sits well with the crimes against women, typical acts of a bully against weaker opponents. It sits well with the negotiations and whining that goes on with the traffic police when they are on their challan spree. It sits well with the jugaad to avoid red tape through connections and wheeling dealing so integral to Delhi’s lifestyle, from the lowly transport department, the police check post to the musty corridors of the South Block and the North Block.
And then there is the Delhi Police. If the AAP government has any valid issue on which to pick a grouse with the central government, it is this absolute apathy of the establishment towards the average Delhi citizen that shrieks the loudest. Some statistics would help to enable a better perspective. Heinous crimes increased by 157% from 3268 to 8403 in one year from 2013 to 2014. Attempted murder was up by 36%, rape by 37% (1693/yr), burglary up by 239%, robbery up by 429%. Every day, the newspapers are filled with items on rapes, murders; carjacking, shoot outs, chain snatching and what have you. By any standards that is huge. We have the land mafia here, the real estate mafia, the hospital admission mafia, the school admission mafia, the parking lot mafia, you name it we have it. From time to time these mafias clash and shoot outs occur, all part of our daily existence
But what is bigger is the silence of the media about it, which is deafening. Compare that with the hue and cry about the law and order in UP and Bihar. To say that the Delhi Police concentrates more on VVIPs would not be an understatement. So while the Delhi police have 78,000 on its strength, 20,000 and more look after VVIP duties. Another tit bit, while during UPA, 332 VVIPs got special protection this number has jumped to 454 under the NDA government. The sad part is that while the media has created a perception of the Wild West about the two states of UP and Bihar, it is shockingly indifferent about what is going on in Delhi. Or maybe no one cares. But there is another aspect. Delhi has one of the higher if not the highest per ca-pita incomes along with a high literacy rate. And yet the populace is not able to bring this aspect of lawlessness to centre stage. But there is more to ponder about this contradiction.
85% of Delhi GSDP comes from the services sector and the rest from industry. This has led to generation of highly vulnerable low paid and informal jobs. So there are shop workers, construction workers, transportation sector workers, maids, cooks, security personnel, street vendors, delivery people, repair mechanics and thus form 86% of workers in the city. The annual increase in population is more from immigration than from natural growth. 30% of the population is now from Bihar and Eastern UP. Sheila Dixit and Vijay Goel initially voiced their concerns but now that Bhojpuri actor who sings his way through interviews, is the face of the Delhi politician, always missing in action and appearing once in a while to give sound bites.
Delhi has a land mass of 1500 sq kms and a population of 1.7 crores and more at last reckoning. At more than 11, 000 persons per sq km, it has a very high population density. Delhi also has a huge soft underbelly. 50% of the population lives in slums and only 25% in planned areas. The population density in the North East part of the city is three times the city’s density, ie, about 33,000 persons/sq km. 22% of the slums in Delhi are using Open Defecation and 55% are using community toilets that are very unhygienic. Is the PMO looking under its nose for the Swacch Bharat campaign? Of course not.
There are multiple agencies running or destroying Delhi, take your pick. There are three local municipal bodies, the NDMC, the Municipal Corporations and the Delhi Cantonment Board. The NDMC looks after the part of Delhi where the Central government and its paraphernalia reside. Of course it is a different world from the rest of Delhi. It is green; it has wide roads, phenomenal police presence, CCTV cameras and what have you. As if to further sharpen the divide, this part of Delhi alone is part of the Smart city plans. At this rate, Delhiites may soon need visas to enter NDMC areas. Then there is the DDA under the Central government, the final arbiter of land allotment in the Capital and rumoured to be a hotbed of corruption. The Delhi police is also under the central government and answerable to no one but a babu in the Home Ministry who is answerable to no one in turn. In short, Delhi is running on auto pilot because when everyone is responsible, no one is responsible.
And that is Delhi’s tragedy. No one belongs to Delhi and Delhi belongs to no one. The Central government and its paraphernalia are in the golden part of the city. Excuse them. The AAP government has total control over aspects like education and health and transport and tourism but can get no land for any of its schemes because that is under the central government. It also has distinct pan India aspirations so most of its energy is spent on telling anyone who will listen how they cannot work but if allowed they can do wonders. So right now they are trying to set the system right. Till then excuse them too.
Then there are the Municipal corporations that are responsible for the civic amenities. They are run by the BJP and so are daggers drawn with the AAP. They get their monies from the AAP government, so the AAP is doing to them what the central government is doing to AAP. As a result, the average Delhiite can shout till he is blue in the face but he is caught in the middle with nowhere to go.
What compounds the problem is the fact that Delhi is the mother of melting pots. From the fading politician to the faded (retired) babu looking for moments under the sun, to the job seeker, to the sustenance seeker, everyone settles down in Delhi, no one belongs here. Unlike in the other metros there is no indigenous population here, only seniority in domicile. The Marathi manoos has the Shiv Sena articulating his angst, the Kannadiga movement gets strong in Bengaluru, Bengalis are overwhelming in Kolkata but Delhi has no binding element to exploit to express its frustration at what it is going through. The Nirbhaya movement and the Anna movement were glorious exceptions but there has been little else of note. Day to day existence is a battle for survival fought alone and with no one watching your back.
And so while the gladiators like AAP and the BJP slug it out over the decaying and overflowing landfills of Delhi, the average Delhiite thanks his stars if he can wrangle his existence and live to fight another day, literally and metaphorically. more
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View all 33 comments Below 33 comments
Mr Mehra.wow!That was breathless!Almost a blogpost!There is no doubt that everyone has a right to Delhi as the national capital.I am still trying to make sense of your comment on what Vijay Goel and Sheila Dikshit were talking about more
Aug 07
rage occurs when traffic is very slow.We can drive in such a way that traffic speed increases .I ti spossible if we know cause of slow speed .SLOW SPEED IS DUE TO TOO MANY VEHICLES AHEAD.Too many vehicles ahead donot allow fellow vehickes to take left or right when they need it with result they stop till some one gives them required side in which one want to go.This problem can be solved if we at back do not poke in to every space available ahead & instead drive slow & at a distence from the vehicle on sides so that there are minimum number of lanes side by side .This will prevent vehicles from back to move forward & will increase speed of vehicle ahead & there by speed of vehicles behind ,so no rage more
Aug 07
What has been said is about an economy/ area of perpetual shortages due to population explosion which no decision maker/ politician accepts. Delhi is over crowded because other areas have been neglected and people migrate to get a decent life. Solutions are aplenty. Our Cantts planned over centuries ago still retain some greenery and quality of life. We have some excellent administrators who can run the show and improve things .... We have enough talent to sustain the city and prevent urban decay . have plenty of solutions and willing to share... It does not require rocket science to regulate things even in the current set up . there are adequate latitude and choices available. more
Jul 20
I agreed with the post. But no solution of problems has provided. I want some more discussion should be held on this. more
Jul 02
Nobody. We voted a Govt. of street louts to power. 67 out of 70 reflects wisdom of Delhi-ites !! It is imperative for Delhi-ites to learn how to love to suffer !! We hate BJP, we hate RSS, we hate VHP...we hate Hindu unity, we love secular animals / Mullas / Maulanas...we, educated fools of Delhi must suffer for next 4 years. more
Jul 01
