Kolkata Korner

Do those who criticise Kolkata and Bengalis harbour a bias against the cityand the community? Before trying to look for answers to that charge, it would beworthwhile to conduct a dispassionate analysis of Kolkata. Such an analysiswould hold good for the community as well since the two are so closelyinter-linked—Kolkata reflects the face of the community and vice versa. 

One doesn't need to go much beyond the state of the city's infrastructure.Bad roads, ill-designed flyovers, overflowing drains, archaic vehicles belchingnoxious fumes, chaotic traffic, contempt for traffic rules, stinking garbage allover, limited road space and tens of thousands of illegal auto-rickshaws—thisis what Kolkata's infrastructure is all about. The British built Calcutta, andBengalis ruined Kolkata. 

After Independence, and more so over the last four decades during whichBengalis decided to make their state the last bastion of a subversive andredundant ideology, no major improvement has happened to the city'sinfrastructure. Kolkata has grown, but in an extremely unscientific, haphazardand bizarre manner. New townships--save for Salt Lake and Kalyani that happenedthanks to the visionary B.C. Roy--that have mushroomed all around are littlemore than an ugly agglomeration of unsightly buildings crowding narrow, crateredlanes lined with clogged and stinking drains. It is only but natural that thosewho stay in such miserable conditions will have their psyche conditioned bytheir wretched surroundings and ambience. To expect art, culture,intellectualism and learning to flourish in such settings would be akin tohoping Narendra Modi would turn secular.

Yes, many parts of Kolkata have got a facelift and new projects likeflyovers. But here, too, good intentions have been marred by colossal stupidityof their planners. Flyovers, for instance, have done little to ease vehicularmovement and traffic congestions. Traffic jams are a regular feature in allcities of the world, but it's only in Kolkata that one gets stuck in a jam everycouple of hundred metres.

Institutions
Calcutta was once home to high-class institutions of global repute. Theseinstitutions spawned high-end research and researchers. They were, truly,world-class centres of excellence. But over the past three decades, these havebeen reduced to pale shadows of their former glorious selves. They've beenstuffed with men of straw whose only qualification to enter the hallowed portalsof such institutions is their communist leanings and subservience to the CPI(M).The Marxists have systematically and viciously destroyed all these institutions. 

Where they have not been able to appoint unqualified partymen to facultypositions (as in Central government-run institutions), they have encouraged theemployees to become undisciplined, shirk work and sabotage the institutions.This state, like all other states, still produces bright young men and women.But all of them migrate to other states due to the poor standard of colleges anduniversities here. 

One Presidency College—and the quality of even this institution hasdeclined immensely—does not matter; Calcutta University is little better than,say, the violence-wracked Lucknow University in terms of teaching standards andresearch. Only some private institutions, like St Xavier's and Loreto College(and the private, especially Christian, schools), can lay claim to fame; andhere, too, the CPI(M) wants to poke its dirty nose by arm-twisting theauthorities to appoint teachers of the party's choice. 

It would be appropriate here to bust the myth about Bengalis' superiorintellect. Calcutta had these famous institutions because the British set themup. Bengalis took advantage, and rightly so, of these institutions ofscientific, western and higher learning to become doctors, engineers, scientistsetc while people in other parts of the country lagged behind due to the absenceof similar institutions in their cities and towns. 

There is, thus, no reason to think that Bengalis have been blessed with asuperior intellect, as Bengalis so proudly claim. And anyway, a community thatreposes faith in a discredited ideology for there decades can hardly call itselfintellectual. The CPI(M) has destroyed institutions because we allowed them todo so; we don't have the guts to stand up and protest Marxists' depredations.Let's accept this fact.

Pollution & public transport

Okay, so nothing much can be done about roadspace and there's little space left to build more flyovers; going undergroundisn't a viable option either in this overcrowded city with a severe shortage ofopen public spaces. But a lot can be changed within these limited parameters tomake travelling around the city less tiring. 

It could not have escaped the mind of theplanners, even the ones with limited or below-average intelligence that we havein this city, to augment the public transport system so that more people usebuses, trams and trains rather than their private transport to get around thecity. For that to happen, the quality of public transport needs to be improveddrastically. We need good, comfortable and more buses, including air-conditionedones, on the streets. We need high-speed trams that are convenient to board anddisembark, we need to expand the Metro Rail network and we need to increase thefrequency of suburban trains so that they aren't crowded and can offer acomfortable journey. 

This will encourage more people to settle down inthe suburbs and will even motivate offices to move out of the city, thusdecongesting Kolkata. And we need to take the highly-polluting buses, trucks,taxis and auto-rickshaws off the streets. But will all this happen, and fast?Not in a hurry, maybe never. 

The reason being that there are too many vestedinterests in letting things continue as they are. The autos, the most pollutingvehicles on Kolkata's roads, enjoy the backing of the powerful CITU and willnever be taken off the roads. They can't be forced to convert to CNG because ofthe CITU's patronage. Those jalopies called buses will continue to ply becausetheir owners, drivers and conductors are all affiliated to the CITU. Ditto fortaxis. 

For the CITU, clean air holds no importance. Butone would expect the government to understand that the financial and social costof treatment of lakhs of Kolkatans who fall victim to various ailments due tothe foul and poisonous air we breathe in is far more than that of a few thousandautos going off the roads. Unfortunately, this government is too short-sightedto comprehend such matters and is happy to preside over the mess and chaos thatKolkata has been reduced to.

Healthcare

Kolkata boasts of as many as four medicalcolleges, one post-graduate medical institute and a number of other medicalinstitutions, not to speak of a plethora of private hospitals. But despite allthese, healthcare is perhaps the worst in Kolkata as compared to all othercities in the country. Newspapers carry reports on cases of appalling negligenceand callousness by doctors and nurses nearly everyday. Attacks on errant doctorsby angry relatives of neglected patients are an everyday occurrence in thehospitals. No treatment worth the name takes place at even district-levelhospitals and since all patients are referred to Kolkata even for smallailments, the government hospitals here are horribly overcrowded. 

To make matters worse, CITU-affiliatednon-medical staff at these hospitals and medical colleges play truant and shirkwork. It's virtually impossible to get a bed or even a simple analgesic at agovernment hospital without the help of touts. Doctors, with some honourableexceptions, are more bothered about their private practices. Archaic rules andprocedures and frustrating red-tape deny critical patients the attention theyurgently need, resulting in frequent deaths. 

There's a huge scam in supply of medicines andequipment to government hospitals. The private ones are good only for those whocan afford to pay; they're known to frequently flout rules to deny treatment toeven emergency cases. Kolkata tops the list of cities with complaints of medicalnegligence. 

While it is no small wonder that hospitalsfunction at all, the whole system runs the risk of collapse any day. And tothink that these very same medical colleges once produced the best doctors inthe country! Why don't they do so anymore? And why do all the best doctors, likethe best and brightest in all other fields, hurriedly leave the city for betterpastures elsewhere in the country and abroad?

Blaming politicians

It is, however, futile to blame only our rulersfor all the ills afflicting Kolkata and for the sorry state that Bengalis findthemselves in today. As they say, we get the politicians that we deserve. Forgetthe dogmatic Marxists who rule over us today; enough has been said about themand we all know what they're all about. But even those in the opposition inspirelittle confidence. 

The chief of the principal opposition party iswhimsical, visionless, mercurial and devoid of any intellect or intelligence.Her followers today are little more than goons and dalals. The leaders of theonly other opposition party of any significance are either in the payroll of theMarxists, or are eagerly awaiting small favours from the latter. In which otherstate do we find such despairing lack of politicians with a vision and purpose?In which other state are politicians, without exception, so banal andunintelligent? In which other state can politicians get away by making puerileand inane statements? Which other state rewards its rulers decade after decadefor presiding over the state's decline? 

One reason why we have such politicians is thatwe are loath to hold them responsible for all that's wrong with our city andstate. Because a large section of us would still blame New Delhi for all that'swrong with us and our state and, hence, absolve our own politicians of all blameand responsibility. But this nonsensical game of blaming New Delhi has gone onfor far too long and Bengalis would do themselves a big favour by admitting thata state and community that wishes to surge ahead will do so irrespective of theCentre's "neglect" or "step-motherly attitude" (two terms welove to use). 

Let us be honest with ourselves and introspect,identify our faults and shortcomings and strive to rectify them, while alsorecognize our strong points and leverage them. It's high time we acceptedresponsibility for our plight and stopped blaming others for our sorry state.