Bangalore-A Metronomical Paradox

Bangalore came alive to me years before I started living here, through my friend's accounts of her summer vacation stay here. I have forgotten many of her anecdotes, but I do have a vivid memory of her narration of the' magical place' called Kemp fort. This was much before the advent of new gen malls, one amongst which, the Kemp fort has given way to.  Her generous admiration together with the awe that inspired, I created a fluffy idea of Bangalore.Namma metro, as it is called here, remained in memory as nothing short of a wonderland. Call it naive, but with it's stature as the IT hub, ‘the happening place' Bangalore was kept revered on a pedestal. The step into reality happened some twenty plus years later, as we moved to Bangalore after a decade hiatus in the American mid-west.


 As is with all cases of grandiose expectations, the reality takes time to sink in.Yes,the weather is pleasant, and there's much greenery. But, I certainly did not expect people queuing with fluorescent pails for water early in the morning which is a rare sight in my hometown of Palakkad itself. People with plush cars belonging to even more plush IT corridors, honking away is something sans logic unless they believe, the traffic can be moved with the power of the decibels thus created!.The inadequate infrastructure and the stand still traffic during rains prompting people to leave their vehicles stranded presented a picture of a metro in dysfunction. Awaiting the gates to open at the railway crossing is hilarious and outright defiant at times. The revving up of many auto rickshaws, the ever maneuvering two wheelers, the countless sedans...everybody vying for the first escape to freedom...resulting in a crammed ,..if-i-cant-move,dare-you-to kind of situation. Finally two inches forward, an inch back..tilt to one side, duck to the other..oh sweet freedom. Only that it took more time had everybody kept to their spots. One of the pastimes could very well be identifying  the cars with dents(almost, a badge of honour)and those without.

The initial disenchantment gave way to the subtle truth. The metro reveals day in and out that this is a place where people trapped in the past and those relishing the present coexist. People who go to the market for buying vegetables and those who find them a click away. People depending on shared auto, and those with an assorted ownership of swanky automobiles. An array of people who come to work for you, driver, cook, gardener, domestic help, sometimes outnumbering those in the house. Each member of the house hooked on to their personal laptops..exemplifying the adage, ”to each his own" the space ,at times creating uncomfortable  distances in relationships. And there are many with the physical lack of space, resulting in  the push and shove, cut throat competition among the lesser privileged. In the context where cozy politicians rattle about the price of meals reminds me of one particular summer, when the area was facing shortage of water..is it a wonder that the swimming pools of apartments and gated communities were pelted with stones?

As the scenario exists today, the population is divided between those who live in secure gated communities or apartments and those who live outside of it. The cocooned existence insulating those who can afford them from the other Bangalore, of which they are reminded by the inconvenient waste dumps on the road sides. Tirelessly,the lack of social and civic sense, is bemoaned by the community wallahs. Their hypocrisy exposed in the lethargy exhibited in  separating their own dry and wet wastes as mandated by the BBMP. They are a population in denial. Defying the statistics, they cannot accept that they belong to the top percentile, of the population. They go by the name the upper middle class as the waste segregation continues without much change.

There is no denying that Bangalore is a pleasant place to live, cosmopolitan at that too, only that its feel off mark to call it a benign city of lakes. Its simply a place on the map for those who have benefited from the boom town and for those it has by passed to be juxtaposed. As long as the latter can live off the former, and it rains enough, there is not much  threat of discord. Hoping the hope is well placed.