Capital frenzy

Capital frenzy

Monday saw scenes that the Capital hasn't witnessed for almost a decade now, not in fact since the days of the Mandal agitation, with buses being burnt, mobs going on the rampage and police resorting to firing. Meanwhile everybody, but everybody, who had anything to do with the current imbroglio in Delhi was busy passing the buck -- from the chief minister of Delhi to the Union minister for urban development to the chief secretary of the state. The slugfest didn't end there -- it soon rapidly descended into a slanging match between the Congress, which is in power in Delhi, and the BJP, which was in power in the state and now heads the ruling coalition at the Centre. Petty squabbling never did make for clarity of thought, otherwise the actors in this tragic tableau would have acknowledged his/her own role in creating the conflagration.

The issue revolved around the urgent need to clean up Delhi's air and water -- while dangerous toxins, both industrial and vehicular, laced its air, the river Yamuna, upon which the city stands, was little more than a glorified sewer, with untreated factory effluents finding their way into it. When the Supreme Court's attention was drawn to this, it passed an order about five years ago, directing the municipal authorities of Delhi to ensure that no licences are issued for the setting up of industrial units in ``non-conforming'' or residential areas. A few months later it ruled that those units which did not have the necessary permission must stop production from January 1997 or agree to be relocated. In the wake of Monday's disturbances, a political solution to the problem was found: According to Delhi MP, V.K. Malhotra, the Masterplan Delhi 2001 is now to be altered, to allow non-polluting industries in residential areas in the Capital. While the move will help cool tempers and bring Delhi back to normalcy,there's no denying that it does little to address the issue at hand -- it might even be regarded as a cop-out, an attempt to address the letter of the court orders, not their spirit. In fact, Union minister for Urban Development Jagmohan had been resisting such a move thus far, presumably for this reason.

There is, of course, no denying the serious human problem of closing down some 100,000 units at short notice and bringing the lives and livelihoods of an estimated 15 lakh people to the brink. But the question is, why was this situation allowed to come about in the first place? The fact is that the state government, whether of the BJP or the Congress kind, had chosen to either ignore the problem or deal with it in a half-hearted manner. The counsel for the state government had to admit in court that an estimated 15,000 licences were issued even after the court rulings. To this day, the definition of what constitutes a ``polluting industry'' remains a fuzzy area. As for relocation measures, they were pathetic, to say the least. The minister for Environment and Forests has just informed Parliament that of the 96,000 units located in residential areas of Delhi, only 683 had installed effluent treatment plants and only some 6,000 odd units have been allotted alternative sites. It will, therefore, not be unfair topin the blame for the recent Delhi riots on its self-seeking and often corrupt political leaders, who first allow an ugly situation to develop and then throw up their hands in despair. Planned urban development cannot be reduced to mere politics.