Smart city.

The much publisiced  pavement plaza in the shopping paradise of whole of Tamil nadu viz Pondibazaar was finally inaugurated by our CM. That day the broad pavements with old type lanterns , and lawns around trees looked good .It was worth the inconvenience we had to put up for more than 2 years or more  A lot of auto's cribbed about the narrow carriageway the broad pavements compressed the roads .From my point of  view viz a pedestrian i welcomed the broad pavements and looked forward to walking on it freely.
If wishes were horses beggars would ride .
The very day after the inauguration all the food carts that occupy a lot of space on this pavement and which had disappeared on the day of inauguration were back .Some food carts viz selling idli , tea etc are quite 'considerate' to us walking intruders into the prime property they are the owners of by occupying only one half of the pavements whilst others 'couldn'tcare less about this smart city pedestrian plaza being built for pedestrians  , occupy the entire pavement and glare if one dares to ask them to move to make way .  I read in papers that policemen are second most corrupt followed by a civic corporations.

I keep seeing policemen patrolling the entire area.quite often but these food carts must be  paying them some  regular money to look the other way .Even if there are policemen, only 19 % are corrupt as per that stats,who would like to remove such encroachers maybe they are scared of politicians who would be dependant on dadas of slum areas like ours  who can muster large people to vote for a  candidate of a political party
On the other day just before the general election  a local dada , a small and slight man was sitting on a plastic chair on the road side with his legs one over the other and shaking them  happily whilst a  a tall and hefty policeman in khaki who had parked his red patrol jeep nearby was standing at front of him in bowed reverence!
It made me laugh at the equations of power .
Newspapers keep writing about how pavements are used for parking etc but hardly any action takes place.I wanted to write about this stubborn encroachment of pedestrian plaza for which centre has spent crores to smarten up the cities but refrained lest action is taken because of my blog and the dadas in neighbourhood whack me for spoiling thier livelihood and disable me from walking..
Certain stretches are quite free but even here one cannot walk freely as the small granite pillars that hinder two wheelers have not been placed The space left for such pillars is obvious to the eyes In  such stretches motorbikes and scooters whizz past in greater speed than on the roads scaring a unwary walker out of thier wits .
This is also the case in Bangalore.When ever i take a walk on these newly laid  pavements i t irks more than walking on roads and normal pavements as i feel this smartening up city and labelling it as pedestrian plaza is gross misnomer and that centre is wasting its resources on such projects .We are not yet fit for such beautifications.

Similarily on the opposite side of the street where i live have slum tenements viz the huts of encroachers had been removed and nice looking single room flats with 3 -4 upper floors had been built .to acomodated the hut dwellers .It is very nicely planned with  a lot of space between flats and plenty of space at front of each of them  and had it been such this street would look real nice  and tidy.But no! each and every available space has been encroached upon making a mockery of  the very objective of building these tenements by the govt .
AS soon as one enters this street a meat shop greets one.It is the first shop of line of shops laid with permanent structures on the side of the road .Next is rice shop , a saloon , a briyani shop , a provision shop , bakery ,  idli batter shop and so on .If one enters this street from other side a tailor shop , a durga temple, a water can shop. saloon ,videography shop , machine grinder shop provisions shop will greet one .In the middle is a shop that sells snacks  and supplies huge quantity of food .All the cooks and helpers will be sitting on the road cutting vegetables  .All these are  encroachments But they all have electricity .Apart from these permanent structures built on govt land there are vendors of flowers, dhobhi, waste paper mart , food carts and vehicles of strangers [as our flats have parking space ]occupying the streets.
There is hardly any carriage way yet huge trucks full of gas cylinders navigate this street as they have  store house between two flat complex on our side .This narrow store house of gas lpg is  between two residential flats .If there is a gas leak and if any one lights a stove near this place all of our houses could go up in flames .But who cares for such hazards till it actually happens?

There is alot of space left in front of our flats .Maybe it was conceived as playing ground or as a park .This space is used for parking by all sorts of people .The gas trucks are also its main usesrs .They park thier trucks there whilst smaller vans and cycle carts take down cylinders or throw them up making a lot of noise .I wonder how the cylinders are withstanding  the wear and tear of being  constantly thrown down   on the hard ground or against one another .

In my street alone there are three smalltemples .All are encroachments on the street .Are those building them really religious or is it to make money during Thiru vizha's ? There are more small small temples for the same deity viz amman and vinayakar inside . built on encroached lands.It is like as if every one wants a temple near them  under their  control like zamindars of yore.

Govts do conceive good plans for the people  but vote banks and yen to make money out of such policies the   hallmark of our democracy destroys it all.