August 15. All of India is awash in an animated display of patriotism. The morning air is filled with the strains of ‘Aye mere watan ke logon...’, ‘Mere desh ki dharti sona ugale...’, ‘Vande Mataram... (Lata Mang-eshkar’s rendition in Anand Math) and other songs which, no matter how many times you have heard them before, give you goosebumps on this special day. Boys at traffic signals are selling paper flags. Even that roadside tea vendor, whose earnings can barely support his family’s meager dal-chawal needs at a time when dal is selling at Rs 80 per kg and chawal at Rs 40 per kg, is sporting a tricolour on his ramshackle handcart. The Prime Minister’s Independence Day speech, delivered from the ramparts of Red Fort, has been watched in the drawing room. It’s now time to attend the flag-hoisting ceremony of my cooperative housing society.

What catches my attention is that the chairman of the society, which houses 200 families, concludes his speech not only with the customary ‘Jai Hind’, but also adds ‘Jai Mumbai’ and ‘Jai Karma Kshetra’ (the name of our housing complex) to it. He has earlier spoken of how India has weathered the global recession, and other good things that have happened in the past year. But he has also drawn the residents’ attention to the looming problems on the national and local horizons—the spectre of drought, the cut in municipal water supply, hence the need to conserve water by implementing a rainwater harvesting project for the building, and what to do to counter swine flu. His call for making Karma Kshetra the best housing society in the area has elicited a big applause.

... contd.