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Friday, February 29, 2008

Chidambaram has done a good thing!

So I am finally back to the budget grind, after two years. The markets are down and some analysts are cribbing about the loan waivers to farmers. What the hell, it is they who suffer and add value; and all the others just profit from their sweat and blood. It is a good thing Chidambaram has done, whether it was political compulsions or not.
In a way the plight of farmers is symptomatic of where we are heading, as a civilisation. The real earners and producers get scant regard or profit for their labours; the manipulators and profiteers are held in high regard and rewarded. As the seers fo yore said, the Mother Earth is now valued only for her minerals and metals. There is no regard for the life forces and the the Cosmic intelligence.
I am wondering how long can man go on pillaging and ravaging the planet. Again, I shudder to think of the consequences this avarice will bring to all creation on Earth.

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Swept aside by the forces of greed and selfishness...

The train I take to work every day travels over the Vashi creek. The area surrounding the creek was once a marshy mangrove, but is now a bustling urban centre. A lot of people are moving into Navi Mumbai, just across the Vashi creek; and the marshland is being filled in ever more rapidly. The ecological implications of these changes are enormous, even to the untrained eye. But strangely, no one seems to be giving it much thought. I even read a news report after I came to Mumbai of the state environment minister saying the remaining mangroves should be cut down to make way for highrises!
My friends, who have been in this city far longer than I have been, tell me that only a few years back there was not one human being in the area. Pioneers here say stories of how hard daily life was in the early days of development, with taxis and even groceries hard to come by.
This transformation has set me thinking: who lived here once and were there wild animals in those ghats overlooking the coast? I still have no answers. But I guess there could have been people here; those that scrapped a living out of the meagre resources that nature offered, much like rural life in India in the early 1960s.
All those people could have been swept off by the fast-paced development. Many of those people would have become dependant on the new economy, after seeing their lands and the countryside which provided them sustenance, being snatched away from them.
It is a sad story, and our rulers are ensuring that it get repeated across the country, day after day. Naxalites and other radical elements may try to profit from this displacement and disempowerment but I don't think they can make any lasting transformation in the way things are going now. The forces of the market, fuelled by greed and selfishness, are too strong to be stopped on their tracks, let alone rolled back, by such radical movements.
So what next? I guess we are heading for a huge ecological disaster. I shudder to think of its dimensions and implications.

Monday, February 25, 2008

At what cost this expansion?

As much as I wanted to post regularly to this blog, my time pressures haven't allowed me to. But I will make up for that soon. As for my experience of Mumbai, yes, I like it; but I also am amazed at the scant regard for life - human and otherwise - that this city has. In the first two weeks since I landed here, I have seen more dead bodies than I have in my entire life. And life goes on ...
Well, the city is booming, thanks to the economy. And the people are good, far nicer than the arrogant and vily crowd you will meet in Delhi. But the cost to the environment due to this expansion can't be ignored. Vast creeks and marshlands are being filled up, mangroves are being levelled, and urban sprawls are springing up everywhere. How long can this go on?
I meet people around me who love this life - they just are too happy with the conveniences and gadgets that this urban life and superstores bring. But I wonder how long this expansion can go on without PERMANENTLY damaging the planet.
Of course, I may sound quirky to voice this idea but I can't avoid doing that. There will be price to pay for this wanton destruction and I really worry about that day of comeuppance.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Finally, In Mumbai - And A New Beginning!

So now I am in Mumbai, the great business hub of India, thanks to my former editor and mentor who is now the top man in a leading business newspaper here. Well, first impressions are the best, they say. And I should say I liked Mumbai far, far better than dry and lifeless Delhi with its extreme climate and rude people. I now regret not having taken up a job in Mumbai several years back, turned off by the crowds I confronted here on my first day - a huge jolt for my small-town sense about crowds!
Okay, the place I stay in is in Navi Mumbai, and while I like the place I am also appalled by the environmental degradation that human development is causing all around. Which is why I think I will devote this blog to that cause and also to examine similar such existential issues from a cosmic standpoint - at least from a standpoint more removed from the rush of happenings taking place around me.