‘Clean India’ is a work in progress. The annual announcement of a list of ‘Cleanest Cities’ by the urban affairs ministry is well-appreciated. Indore, the commercial hub of Madhya Pradesh, has ranked first in these lists for the sixth time in a row; the second position going to Surat in Gujarat and the third to Navi Mumbai, a loosely planned city outside Mumbai. The seventh edition of the Swachh Survekshan Awards 2022 again missed the name of the big cities – all of which are concrete jungles in a terrible mess where people suffocate due to lack of planned infrastructure. Travel within these congested cities is by itself an ordeal. It also must be stressed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Swachh Bharat Abhiyan and the Smart City Project have not made much of a difference to life.
One undeniable fact is the lethargy of the establishment to enforce rules and the recalcitrant hoi polloi which makes any progress difficult in this country. Politicians take the path of least resistance and refuse to take hard stances on any issue for fear of losing votes. Discipline is the first casualty and the system of democracy thrives amid the cacophony of unruly action and sounds in the streets. The Smart City Project involved 100 cities and some 5,000 sets of projects planned at a cost of over Rs two lakh crores. Its aim was to improve the quality of life and enable local area development. However, of the funds earmarked for these, half actually go towards lining the pockets of politicians and bureaucrats, with very little left to serve any real purpose. The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan was launched in 2014 with a promise to make India Clean by the year 2019 – marking the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. For effect, the Prime Minister took a broom in Delhi’s Mandir Marg, wielded a spade near River Ganga in his Varanasi constituency and even did ‘plogging’ at Mamallapuram beach and gave out the mantra, “Na Gandagi karenge, Na Karne Denge’.
Persuasion by itself works no wonders here. India’s disorderly life is well-documented and hence, despite its massive arrays of monuments built in the royal era, this nation does not figure much in the global tourism circuit. It’s mostly a drama other than in Rajasthan and Agra. Our water bodies have turned into receptacles for the urban and commercial filth and are so polluted that these are a shame by themselves. Irreverential dumping of bodies of dead kin into rivers like the Ganga comes naturally to an indulgent population. Religion has become the biggest excuse. Our seas throw up a lot of garbage in states like Odisha and Maharashtra. When will the rulers of this country crack the whip on polluters?
