Saturday, November 17, 2007

Infrastructure growth enabled by reduced investment

Either news on TV is getting bizarre or the world is ( or more likely both ) .

Watched a news item on NDTV yesterday where the reporter was speaking to some govt official in Bangalore about the infrastructure in Bangalore or rather the absence of it . Even those who make infrequent visits to the city can attest to the chaos that prevails due to the lack of even the most basic of infrastructures - roads . With a virtually non-existent public transport most people have no option but to buy a vehicle to commute .

Coming back to the news item . The govt official said " We have to improve the infrastructure . Otherwise new investments will not come into Bangalore " Wow ! Citizens of Bangalore should be thankful that the prospect of new investments slowing down is finally rousing the govt administration from it's slumber . The quality of life of the millions of residents of the city is apparently not reason enough for the govt to improve the infrastructure. Then the official droned " We are building helipads so that VVIPS can take a helicopter from the airport into the city and they don't have to waste time " . What about the millions of people who have to commute daily on the city's non-existent roads ?
It would be too much to expect that people who display such quality of thought may have even considered what a waste of fuel it will mean to increase air traffic by encouraging helicopter usage .
The general idea seems to be to have traffic at different levels of the atmosphere starting from the ground level . And label it ' progress' .
There would be many who may choose to see this as a victory of sorts for business .That reduced investments have at last and at least prompted a lethargic administration into some action .We can't afford for our cities to improve only for the sake of fresh business investment or imagery. Is the quality (and often duration ) of lives of it's residents not reason enough ?

3 comments:

ecophilo said...

Well, infrastructure and Bangalore is an oxymoron. Life is basically a never ending pothole filled traffic jam for the ordinary citizen while the politicians are busy with their real estate and mining games...

Arvind Kaul said...

Why single out Bangalore. Most cities are in a similar state.

ARVIND KAUL

Savitha Rao said...

True . This post re Blore is representative of other parts of India .