Every city shudders at the thought of the unpredictable disrupting the thrum of life – a gang of terrorists perhaps, or nature suddenly frothing and fuming, teetering out of human control. The unpredictable upsets the clockwork precision of urban life, imperilling our ability to organise mass living. Until the balance is restored the chaotic scenes have a touch of the apocalypse.
Yet, in such frightening moments, in what appears to be the end of the world as we know it, there arises in us the spirit to battle against elements larger than us. It is to this human spirit novelist Ernest Hemingway paid homage when he said, “Man can be destroyed but not defeated.” Our refusal to be vanquished in moments menacing to us becomes our defining trait, our descriptor, our marker. It is how we would want others to know us.
Mumbai showed it in the days following the night of November 26, 2008, when terrorists sailed across from the shores of Pakistan to spray bullets at random. The night of anarchy claimed lives, but could not batter the spirit of Mumbai.
With the predictability and relentlessness of the Arabian Sea lashing the shores of Mumbai, its citizens too returned to life and living, a little saddened at the scars inflicted on their city, but not allowing fear to cripple them. Mumbaikars proudly said this is what they are – Resilient – ignoring the taunts of the cynical who argued they had no other choice but to be, yes, resilient.
Wonder what the cynical, argumentative Indian would say about Chennai’s compassion which matched in depth, or height, the flood waters that inundated it? Its people opened their doors to anybody seeking refuge, regardless of caste or religion or economic status. Hierarchies melted, boundaries collapsed, self-interest seemed a forgotten word. In years to come they will perhaps exclaim: C for Chennai, C for Compassion.
It is now the turn of Delhiites to prove their mettle, whether they wish to become the change they want to see around themselves. They will be put to the test from January 1, 2016, when the city-state government will introduce the odd-even number plate car policy. Delhiites can’t complain they were caught off-guard, as Mumbaikars were on 26/11. Like schoolchildren taking the board examination, they have had the time to prepare for it.
The defining trait
Nor can they feign ignorance about the silent killer looming over them. The killer is the air they breathe, the particulate matter they inhale every time they step out of their homes, each measuring two and one-half microns, that is, 30 times less than the width of hair, invisible but deadly, penetrating the lungs, triggering breathing problems, asthmatic attacks, cardiac arrests, persistent sore throats and fever.
The time has come for Delhiites to show whether the poison in their blood has withered their spirit beyond resuscitation and reclamation. It is time Delhiites discover a trait that defines them, becomes their descriptor, their essence. What could that be?
For a good 25-plus years, Delhiites have been complaining about the city’s deteriorating air quality, the sting it possesses. In the mid-nineties, long before the Metro emerged out from Delhi’s belly and flyovers arched over vehicular congestion, during peak-hour traffic on Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, your eyes would water within 10 minutes of being there. Friends returning to Delhi from holiday in the hills or hometowns would complain of headache for days. They would consult the doctor, who would day, “Pollution”, precisely the word he or she tossed at you when you went to him with a sore throat.
There were environmentalists who warned you about Delhi’s air. MC Mehta was one of them. In response to his petition, the Supreme Court introduced Delhiites to the concept of clean fuel. On July 28, 1998, it ordered that the entire city bus fleet must run on CNG from March 31, 2001.
The pollution in Delhi was then more a sensory experience than verified from a factsheet to which perhaps only environmentalists and doctors had access. The bus lobby fussed and fulminated, lamented at the cost involved in switching over to CNG, bemoaned the absence of good CNG conversion kits, and suggested they might get thrown out of business, consequently putting on the line the jobs of drivers and conductors as well. Our heartstrings were tugged; we wavered, but not the judges.
In two years or so, the popular verdict in Delhi was that there had been a dramatic improvement in its air quality, based, again, on our sensory experience. The air no longer had the acrid smell, the eyes did not smart and water, and the lungs inhaled and exhaled just a bit more freely. Smog (mistakenly called fog) no longer shrouded the city with the impenetrable density and predictable frequency of the nineties. But all these gains were frittered away, largely because of wanton indulgence, the consequences of which we were to suffer later.
Squandering the gains
Delhiites, riding the crest of prosperity, began to poison themselves. Cars became affordable because loans had become cheaper. New models, glitzy and larger than before, seduced us. Fuel-guzzlers enhanced the owner’s self-worth. Possession of automobiles became an indicator of social status.
The city expanded to envelop districts of neighbouring states, increasing manifold the distance between home and workplace. The incessant construction of apartment buildings, malls, offices, and infrastructure released tonnes of dust in the air, stifling and choking us.
In Mumbai, the mass killers were the terrorists. In Chennai, it was the angry waters. In Delhi, the killer resides in us. It is through our lifestyle that we have turned the air poisonous.
As Delhi witnessed a facelift and took to the culture of consumerism, there was also the birth of a new consciousness. In the drawing rooms of the chattering classes, the quality of Delhi’s air became a subject of discussion, competing with such issues as cholesterol and blood pressure reading and the state of the nation. The consensus was that something needed to be done – and urgently.
As always, the middle class was schizophrenic in its responses. It wished the city’s air quality would improve but didn’t want to sacrifice what they thought was their necessity (cars to commute). So they railed against the creaking and overcrowded transport system, the inconveniences inherent in taking to it. In reality, though, the public transport system was an assault to their class sensibilities. They claimed it was the government’s responsibility to ensure clean air.
But among the middle class were also the politically conscious, particularly the young, who argued against the assumptions of the privileged. They said the principal polluter should too accept the responsibility of reducing pollution and make sacrifices, as is demanded of the United States in climate change conferences.
A different ethos
The middle class activists entered the debate armed with factsheets. To combat the invisible killer, to rally the people, they were required to reel out statistics. Particulate matter figures were cited, medical studies were publicised, a relatively successful movement was spawned among schoolchildren to refrain from bursting firecrackers on Diwali.
Two other additional factors facilitated the endeavour to make Delhi’s air quality a priority issue to tackle. For one, Delhi is the hub of the media, which was consequently sensitive to the quality of air its own breathed. The media expanded awareness about the grim problem of pollution confronting Delhi. The earlier sensory experience now acquired statistical validity.
Over the last few weeks I have gone around the city asking people at random about the pollution. The level of awareness about the need to tackle the invisible enemy is astonishingly high. No doubt, the poor still rate the issue of economic uplift infinitely higher than that of environment, yet it is understood that a focus on one issue doesn’t have to be to the exclusion of the other.
Two, this awareness is directly linked to Delhi becoming an increasingly political city, in sharp contrast to what it was 25 years ago. It was then a gargantuan task to combine and assemble people on a contentious issue. Delhi’s citizens lacked empathy; they scarcely looked beyond their own narrow interests.
All this has changed quite visibly – the narrow support of the Justice for Jessica movement expanded enormously during the anti-corruption agitation of Anna Hazare and, later, in protests against the brutal gang-rape and murder of the physiotherapist. Delhi now clamours and demands; it does not readily accept the status quo.
The larger good
Perhaps Delhi’s metamorphosis is because of the change in its demography over the years. From different parts of the Hindi heartland, particularly Bihar, people have been flocking to Delhi, either in search of jobs or better education or for the comforts of the metropolis. Politics was an aspect of their life back home. It determined their access to resources. To Delhi, they brought their political selves, redefined in a modern idiom.
This change has turned the city of bureaucrats into the metropolis of activists, rendering it easier for environmentalists to persuade people about the tenability of their factsheets, detailing, in frightening figures, death by breath.
Chennai’s compassion shone during the floods of November-December this year. Mumbai’s resilience impressed all of us in 2008. What quality should Delhi opt for to establish its uniqueness, a quality which could become the descriptor of its personality? When Hemingway said man can be destroyed but not defeated, he had in mind the elements or the implacable rival external to the human being.
For Delhiites, though, the enemy, the rival, the killer, lurks in them. So perhaps, from January 1, 2016, Delhiites need to overcome the temptation of being seduced by the luxury of convenience and consumerism they can afford, in pursuit of the larger good. Call it Altruism or Overcoming Yourself. Should Delhiites fail on January 1 and thereafter, they will be both defeated and, ultimately, destroyed.
Ajaz Ashraf is a journalist in Delhi. His novel, The Hour Before Dawn, has as its backdrop the demolition of the Babri Masjid. It is available in bookstores.
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Yet, in such frightening moments, in what appears to be the end of the world as we know it, there arises in us the spirit to battle against elements larger than us. It is to this human spirit novelist Ernest Hemingway paid homage when he said, “Man can be destroyed but not defeated.” Our refusal to be vanquished in moments menacing to us becomes our defining trait, our descriptor, our marker. It is how we would want others to know us.
Mumbai showed it in the days following the night of November 26, 2008, when terrorists sailed across from the shores of Pakistan to spray bullets at random. The night of anarchy claimed lives, but could not batter the spirit of Mumbai.
With the predictability and relentlessness of the Arabian Sea lashing the shores of Mumbai, its citizens too returned to life and living, a little saddened at the scars inflicted on their city, but not allowing fear to cripple them. Mumbaikars proudly said this is what they are – Resilient – ignoring the taunts of the cynical who argued they had no other choice but to be, yes, resilient.
Wonder what the cynical, argumentative Indian would say about Chennai’s compassion which matched in depth, or height, the flood waters that inundated it? Its people opened their doors to anybody seeking refuge, regardless of caste or religion or economic status. Hierarchies melted, boundaries collapsed, self-interest seemed a forgotten word. In years to come they will perhaps exclaim: C for Chennai, C for Compassion.
It is now the turn of Delhiites to prove their mettle, whether they wish to become the change they want to see around themselves. They will be put to the test from January 1, 2016, when the city-state government will introduce the odd-even number plate car policy. Delhiites can’t complain they were caught off-guard, as Mumbaikars were on 26/11. Like schoolchildren taking the board examination, they have had the time to prepare for it.
The defining trait
Nor can they feign ignorance about the silent killer looming over them. The killer is the air they breathe, the particulate matter they inhale every time they step out of their homes, each measuring two and one-half microns, that is, 30 times less than the width of hair, invisible but deadly, penetrating the lungs, triggering breathing problems, asthmatic attacks, cardiac arrests, persistent sore throats and fever.
The time has come for Delhiites to show whether the poison in their blood has withered their spirit beyond resuscitation and reclamation. It is time Delhiites discover a trait that defines them, becomes their descriptor, their essence. What could that be?
For a good 25-plus years, Delhiites have been complaining about the city’s deteriorating air quality, the sting it possesses. In the mid-nineties, long before the Metro emerged out from Delhi’s belly and flyovers arched over vehicular congestion, during peak-hour traffic on Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, your eyes would water within 10 minutes of being there. Friends returning to Delhi from holiday in the hills or hometowns would complain of headache for days. They would consult the doctor, who would day, “Pollution”, precisely the word he or she tossed at you when you went to him with a sore throat.
There were environmentalists who warned you about Delhi’s air. MC Mehta was one of them. In response to his petition, the Supreme Court introduced Delhiites to the concept of clean fuel. On July 28, 1998, it ordered that the entire city bus fleet must run on CNG from March 31, 2001.
The pollution in Delhi was then more a sensory experience than verified from a factsheet to which perhaps only environmentalists and doctors had access. The bus lobby fussed and fulminated, lamented at the cost involved in switching over to CNG, bemoaned the absence of good CNG conversion kits, and suggested they might get thrown out of business, consequently putting on the line the jobs of drivers and conductors as well. Our heartstrings were tugged; we wavered, but not the judges.
In two years or so, the popular verdict in Delhi was that there had been a dramatic improvement in its air quality, based, again, on our sensory experience. The air no longer had the acrid smell, the eyes did not smart and water, and the lungs inhaled and exhaled just a bit more freely. Smog (mistakenly called fog) no longer shrouded the city with the impenetrable density and predictable frequency of the nineties. But all these gains were frittered away, largely because of wanton indulgence, the consequences of which we were to suffer later.
Squandering the gains
Delhiites, riding the crest of prosperity, began to poison themselves. Cars became affordable because loans had become cheaper. New models, glitzy and larger than before, seduced us. Fuel-guzzlers enhanced the owner’s self-worth. Possession of automobiles became an indicator of social status.
The city expanded to envelop districts of neighbouring states, increasing manifold the distance between home and workplace. The incessant construction of apartment buildings, malls, offices, and infrastructure released tonnes of dust in the air, stifling and choking us.
In Mumbai, the mass killers were the terrorists. In Chennai, it was the angry waters. In Delhi, the killer resides in us. It is through our lifestyle that we have turned the air poisonous.
As Delhi witnessed a facelift and took to the culture of consumerism, there was also the birth of a new consciousness. In the drawing rooms of the chattering classes, the quality of Delhi’s air became a subject of discussion, competing with such issues as cholesterol and blood pressure reading and the state of the nation. The consensus was that something needed to be done – and urgently.
As always, the middle class was schizophrenic in its responses. It wished the city’s air quality would improve but didn’t want to sacrifice what they thought was their necessity (cars to commute). So they railed against the creaking and overcrowded transport system, the inconveniences inherent in taking to it. In reality, though, the public transport system was an assault to their class sensibilities. They claimed it was the government’s responsibility to ensure clean air.
But among the middle class were also the politically conscious, particularly the young, who argued against the assumptions of the privileged. They said the principal polluter should too accept the responsibility of reducing pollution and make sacrifices, as is demanded of the United States in climate change conferences.
A different ethos
The middle class activists entered the debate armed with factsheets. To combat the invisible killer, to rally the people, they were required to reel out statistics. Particulate matter figures were cited, medical studies were publicised, a relatively successful movement was spawned among schoolchildren to refrain from bursting firecrackers on Diwali.
Two other additional factors facilitated the endeavour to make Delhi’s air quality a priority issue to tackle. For one, Delhi is the hub of the media, which was consequently sensitive to the quality of air its own breathed. The media expanded awareness about the grim problem of pollution confronting Delhi. The earlier sensory experience now acquired statistical validity.
Over the last few weeks I have gone around the city asking people at random about the pollution. The level of awareness about the need to tackle the invisible enemy is astonishingly high. No doubt, the poor still rate the issue of economic uplift infinitely higher than that of environment, yet it is understood that a focus on one issue doesn’t have to be to the exclusion of the other.
Two, this awareness is directly linked to Delhi becoming an increasingly political city, in sharp contrast to what it was 25 years ago. It was then a gargantuan task to combine and assemble people on a contentious issue. Delhi’s citizens lacked empathy; they scarcely looked beyond their own narrow interests.
All this has changed quite visibly – the narrow support of the Justice for Jessica movement expanded enormously during the anti-corruption agitation of Anna Hazare and, later, in protests against the brutal gang-rape and murder of the physiotherapist. Delhi now clamours and demands; it does not readily accept the status quo.
The larger good
Perhaps Delhi’s metamorphosis is because of the change in its demography over the years. From different parts of the Hindi heartland, particularly Bihar, people have been flocking to Delhi, either in search of jobs or better education or for the comforts of the metropolis. Politics was an aspect of their life back home. It determined their access to resources. To Delhi, they brought their political selves, redefined in a modern idiom.
This change has turned the city of bureaucrats into the metropolis of activists, rendering it easier for environmentalists to persuade people about the tenability of their factsheets, detailing, in frightening figures, death by breath.
Chennai’s compassion shone during the floods of November-December this year. Mumbai’s resilience impressed all of us in 2008. What quality should Delhi opt for to establish its uniqueness, a quality which could become the descriptor of its personality? When Hemingway said man can be destroyed but not defeated, he had in mind the elements or the implacable rival external to the human being.
For Delhiites, though, the enemy, the rival, the killer, lurks in them. So perhaps, from January 1, 2016, Delhiites need to overcome the temptation of being seduced by the luxury of convenience and consumerism they can afford, in pursuit of the larger good. Call it Altruism or Overcoming Yourself. Should Delhiites fail on January 1 and thereafter, they will be both defeated and, ultimately, destroyed.
Ajaz Ashraf is a journalist in Delhi. His novel, The Hour Before Dawn, has as its backdrop the demolition of the Babri Masjid. It is available in bookstores.