By Phrangsngi Pyrtuh
World environment day got over a month back with the usual paraphernalia and bothersome exercise of long talks and boring speeches. Colleges, schools and what have you put up a grand display of their love for the environment (and Shillong) never mind that some of them are also opposed to the NGT ban on coal mining. Leave that as it may since it seems we have come a long way since 5th June. I want to butt in and shed some thoughts on a recent trend in this paper expressing albeit in differently form and manner the need to clean Shillong once called the Scotland of the East and often regarded as one of the cleanest hill stations in India. Cleanliness was our Unique Selling Proposition (USP ) then but which we have now lost, hence the need to revitalize this idea of a clean Shillong.
The city was loved not only for its pine trees but for its sheen image- a spick and span city if you like. Fast-forwarding to the present time we are left wandering where it all went wrong (except Mawlynnong perhaps). If the idea is to beautify Shillong to make it more tourist friendly then this is unfortunate. Shillong should be clean for its own people and this should become the priority more than anything else. This of course requires course correction through empowerment and symbiotic connection with the past and the future. Toki Blah’s article appearing on July 10th 2014 and previous articles/letters identified various loopholes for the systematic decline of our beloved city. These articles and letters are highly opinionated and come from people who care. But is anyone listening?
Past events and cleaning programmes from the government and other actors have been anything but encouraging. Different organizations and institutions were launched to clean every nook and corner of the city including the feeder streams and rivulets which are now choc-a-block with the filth and dirt of the city with no visible (or temporary) success. Each have their own version of a clean Shillong which is good but there seems to be lack of co-ordination and unison in vision. The idea of cleaning Shillong is becoming more competitive rather than a cooperative or complementary. This is evident in the annual ritual conducted by the government to judge the cleanest locality in town. I strongly feel that this exercise should be abandoned if we are to make any progress at all. I wish not to elaborate the direness that this competitive approach on cleanliness has inflicted on Shillong for it has clearly and miserably failed. If I delve deeper we need calibrated methods that Toki Blah alluded to as a synergy from all the stakeholders treating them all as equal partners.
There exist a social paralysis when it comes to cleaning Shillong. The most important reason is that our etiquettes (chewing and spitting, lime decoration on public walls etc) have not changed even as we cope with modernization and global values on etiquettes et al. The people (and organizations) spearheading the clean Shillong drive should lead from the front and I count myself as one of those. Recently I debated on this issue with a friend and inadvertently expressed my hopelessness at the idea of a clean Shillong. Yet I know there is hope if we care to look deeper inside and not focus on the external aspects of the drive. The society has to change or at least make an effort to change so that this noble objective does not become a wild goose chase.
I am much taken when I saw what the Japanese supporters did in the ongoing FIFA World Cup match that Japan played against Greece. They stayed back and cleaned the stadium throwing the empty beer cans and what have you in bins and polythene bags. They earned the praise of the world and the entire focus of the world cup changed. One must study how the Japanese internalize cleanliness in their every day habits. They wear it on their sleeves and practice it wherever they are (and go).
There is much to hope for in our endeavor to clean Shillong. It should be an ongoing exercise taking the confidence of the Dorbar Shnong through sustained outreach programmes. Our education system must inculcate a syllabi on the Khasi-Jaintia way of life which has earned the praise and admiration of our colonial masters and visitors to the city (which now seems like a grandmother’s tale). Politicization of this all important objective must be shunned. And to this we need leaders to usher in the change. One must look at the success story of Colombia’s Bagota model on traffic management which was once upon a time the worst city to drive your car through. This change came about when a capable leader, the Mayor of Bagota, Antanas Mockus pushed his innovative traffic model and city governance despite all odds. The Bagota traffic model is now a standard case study in urban governance and replicated in different cities of the world (eg the BRT network in New Delhi) and the Mayor is widely credited for his long untiring vision to get the job done at whatever cost. Do we have decision makers that will call a spade for a spade? Can we relegate petty issues aside so that there is hope for the next generation? Who is ready to preach and practice? We cannot keep this issue hanging fire any longer. We must act now!