You’ve Got Chaos. Yet Again.

It’s the same sight and same story year after year. After months of scorching heat, the much-awaited monsoons visit Delhi and rain so much chaos all over that one is forced to feel sorry about waiting for the rains in the first place. The situation is repeated oh-so-often during the monsoon months that not only the scenes of waterlogged streets, caved-in roads and massive traffic jams, but even the news stories reporting about the same have now begun to appear stale and repetitive.

Now, it’s not as if only the by lanes and minor arterial roads of the city experience deterioration due to the rains. The scenario is same on even the highways and newly constructed roads. But this is not to say that there is not a single stretch in the city that is able to withstand the wrath of the rains. In fact, there are some stretches, such as those in the Chanakyapuri area where all the embassies are located, that do not undergo any declension even after the heaviest downpours. The reason behind this discrepancy is all too evident: usage of quality material instead of substandard equipments in constructing such resilient roads.

And the reason why not all major roads are built like the roads in areas like Chanakyapuri is also too obvious: intensive and extensive corruption at all levels of the civic agencies. That the authorities are able to get away by using substandard construction material while building and renovating roads is somewhat surprising. After all, the construction and renovations do not take place under creaky office tables or inside the premises of dilapidated government buildings, but are executed absolutely in the open, within full public view. The fact that the same inferior quality of material has been in use since decades paints a very worrisome picture of the lack of policing, monitoring and regularization in the city that’s preparing to host its biggest event roughly after a month. With such a sorry state of affairs, it can only be hoped that there is a complete dry spell when the Games are on in October, since hoping that the condition of the roads would improve by then seems like a very far-fetched utopian dream.