Keep Delhi out of your itinerary for next 10 days

Delhi is on the boil. The sealing drive by Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) has taken an ugly turn yesterday. 3 people had reportedly died in police firing on unruly mob protesting these sealing. It was a different matter that rioters and hooligans had taken over from the genuinely affected traders. There is so much unemployment and spare time to indulge in such banal things. The cumulative destructive energies built in their devil’s workshops erupt causing lots of pains to fellow human beings. It was clearly seen from television clippings that hooligans were on rampage damaging any public property came on their way. They went on to pelt stone and damage those state of the art Metro coaches as well. Roads were blocked all across Delhi and vehicles were damaged, including private ones. The pelted stones do not know whether the vehicle it is landing is a private or public one. It is one of the serious problems I have observed in Delhi. If you see a mob, it is better steer away. This is specially true in low cost and juggi jhupri areas. These people vent their frustration on anyone passing by. You can not simply do anything rather than be a mute spectator while your vehicle is hit by some lumpen elements in the mob. Such rampant damage of public and private property is highly deplorable and no amount of clarification can justify them. The problem is that these lumpen elements of society do not pay any taxes and so the public properties are not erected out of their hard earned money.

It is a different matter the sealing of shops has turned life difficult for both the traders and customers. In India, we are used to shops on ground floors. In fact a property by a main road had its value for the opportunity it provides to indulge in commercial activity. However in many cases such shops had grown into full fledged markets and being unplanned construction without any associated parking, etc. they become necessary evils. They were the root of most traffic jams. We had a full fledged market at Madhu Vihar in the area we live. It was a good market for the residents of Patparganj as most of the things were available at reasonable rates obviating the need to go to bigger markets. But this entire market has been closed down last week as it was one of those ground and first floor markets in residential buildings. It was the cause of traffic jams every evening at the Madhu Vihar chowk. But now there is neither the jam nor the market. And we are forced to look for far away markets. For many traders, it will be a black Diwali as lakhs and lakhs of rupees invested in their shops has gone down the drain.

Hopefully a solution will be arrived and we will have better Delhi.

(It is advisable to avoid Delhi for next few days, specially going to the markets like Karol Bagh, Lajpat Nagar, etc. Situations may turn violent any time and you may get stuck in unnecessary traffic jams)