Open sky and dirty underbelly
Face of a shanty town
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: July 28, 2012 -

It was a downpour, no doubt about it and yes it lasted more than 30 minutes.

And it was more than enough to turn numerous lanes, bylanes and even some of the main roads in Imphal into a sea of water.

It was not only a case of the sky opening but also succeeded in opening the dirty underbelly of Imphal, Which fits the bill of a shanty town rather than a capital city.

Urban squalor but without any of the accompanying benefits of an urban centre, this is what fits the description of Imphal.

A pathetic understanding of development, wherein only concrete structures are taken as the yardstick and Imphal has had to pay a price, a heavy one at that, for this lopsided understanding of progress.

The Congress has been in power for ten years and is now well into its third innings, yet there is nothing to suggest that some thoughts have been given to something as basic as town planning.

In its true essence, projects are taken up to convenience the public, but these can have a diminishing return when the projects prolong for years, sans any signs of completion.

For years the people of Imphal had to bear the dust and slush kicked up by the construction work of BT Flyover, the implementing agency too must have lost track of the time it has taken to finalise the construction/repairing work of RIMS road and the Imphal Sewerage Project, in the offing for more than five or six years, continues to jangle the nerves of the people.

Top the unfinished projects with the brazenness in which the Government has been going around with the tasks at hand and it is not surprisingly to see what a downpour lasting for some time can do to Imphal.

Chief Minister O Ibobi and his men better start seeing and acknowledging the reality.

Road expansion works will fall on its face if a corresponding importance is not given to the drainage system.

With the population pressure on Imphal increasing with each passing year, it is long past the time to sit down to the rudiments of planning.

It was some years back, under this same dispensation, that the Government grandly announced a ban on use of plastic carry bags.

Today no one knows what has happened to this grandiose announcement.

A telling example of how casually the Government has been towards something as pressing and urgent as environment and urban planning.

Nowhere is the absence of urban planning more visible than the traffic chaos and Confusion that dogs Imphal every day.

If the matter was not so serious, it would have elicited guffaws from all over, but the on-off stand over the entry of vehicles in the main commercial centres of Imphal reflects the hollowness of the Government.

It is not amusing, but comical.

A Government cannot be run on adhocism.

Somthing as serious as traffic management cannot be reduced to the status of trial runs.

Why doesn't this bare and simple fact register in the minds of the people who matter? So it stands that when it rains, the people have to cope with gutter water and slushy roads and when it does not it has to be dusty roads and rotting garbage's.

The Government the people have to suffer and democracy looks like a heavy price to pay.