Trust Delhi’s Babudom to come up with the craziest, most impractical and utterly bizarre ideas. It would appear they compete with one another to devise schemes that can cause the maximum possible inconvenience and harassment to residents and visitors.
First they experimented with a Mad Hatter idea called BRT. After wreaking havoc on South Delhi’s roads, causing a few dozen deaths through accidents and spending upward of `100 crore of public money, it was recently dismantled at the intervention of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
Similarly they buckled under VVIP pressure and built only a one-way flyover at the Rao Tula Ram Road intersection near the airport, resulting in mind-blowing traffic jams. Even while the one-way menace was under construction, road users had vocally argued that such a structure would only worsen and not ease traffic congestion. What every layman knew, it took our super-intelligent officials 10 years to comprehend. Now the flyover is finally being expanded to make it a two-way bridge.
The latest example of a scatter-brained plan is the move to “pedestrianise” Connaught Place, New Delhi’s iconic heart and global showpiece. Sugar-coated as a plan to develop a “Happy Zone” on the lines of small segments in Paris and Hong Kong, our Babus don’t care how many will be rendered unhappy by their “happy” idea. They also don’t care about the murderous assaults made on CP over the last 20 years, building the Metro (twice over) and digging up its streets in the name of beautification for the Commonwealth Games. Now they have finally hit up a foolproof idea to kill off Connaught Place altogether.
They plan to ensure that shops, including those running for nearly 100 years, shut down for good, restaurants and bars down their shutters, cinema halls become unviable and CP is bereft of footfalls.
Over time it is likely that a deserted Connaught Place will become an extended den of drug addicts and other anti-socials; it will become an area where women dread to tread especially after sundown. Today’s vibrant, bustling CP will become GP or Ghost Place, with maybe a few octogenarians visiting some places only for the sake of nostalgia. In India car-free zones never work because we are like that only! While rival markets will thrive, Connaught Place will only hum melancholy songs (like “Jaane kahan gaye who din”) recalling its glorious past.
The worst thing about this hare-brained idea is that those charged with imposing it on the people of Delhi have no clue why they are doing what they are doing. Officials of the New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) claim they want to revert to 1999 when there were open dining spaces in inner circle. Were they even here in 1999IJ Do they know what open eateries they are talking aboutIJ
The only open eatery in Connaught Place in recent times was the Coffee House that hosted a committed clientele under awnings where the Jeevan Deep and Jeevan Bharati Buildings now stand. Almost immediately after the Emergency was imposed, bulldozers (allegedly at the behest of Sanjay Gandhi) reduced it to rubble. It was a meeting place of various “subversives” or so it was alleged by the Government of the day, George Fernandes being among the so-called “enemies of the State”. The other open air restaurant was Rambles located near the fountain inside the Central Park. It too was shut down because police believed it had become a pick-up joint. So are NDMC officials hallucinating that CP was once an Indian variant of Paris’ MontmarteIJ
But undaunted by their ignorance of history, the babus are working round-the-clock to impose “car bandi” for three months to start with, barely three weeks from now. The idea to make CP a vehicle free zone was conceived by NDMC in 2005 when enormous space for car parking was available.
Our “cultured” babus want to promote open air theatres in CP, but when approached to participate, the National School of Drama refused saying there was too much noise in CP at present. Presumably the Mandi House roundabout, where NSD students regularly practice street plays, is a Zone of Silence!
Clearly, the NDMC, the nodal agency to implement this grandiose but ill-conceived scheme, is still groping in the dark. When questioned about their preparedness for the plan, they try to pass the buck on the Union Ministry of Urban Development (UDM) and the Delhi Traffic Police. They said they were awaiting the response from the Delhi Police about the vehicular plan while Delhi Police officials said they will come out with a plan once the NDMC comes out with the detailed plan of action. But officials of the UDM told The Pioneer that this is entirely the plan of the NDMC and “we have merely given in-principle approval”.
The absence of clarity in this highly publicised car bandi plan is perplexing as NDMC officials declared it on the basis of old reports without considering the vehicular flow and the sheer number of visitors from outside Delhi too, including foreign tourists, who come to CP to shop and dine or simply amble along its pavements.
The contentious project was approved in 2007 by the then Principal Secretary with Delhi Urban Art Commission (DUAC). During Commonwealth Games, the project was discussed again but shelved once more.
According to an NDMC official, the project is inspired from Paris and New York. “We have studied the redevelopment structures of big cities of the world and we have tried to cultivate such facilities here,” said the official. Although it is doubtful if any of our town planners are fully cognizant of the planning that went into pedestrian zones of Paris and New York’s Woodstock village.
When asked, what special plan they have for frequent visitors of CP, the officials were not forthcoming. Passing the buck on the Delhi Traffic Police and the UDM, the NDMC has said that the action plan will be prepared by either UDM, Delhi Traffic Police or Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC).
When asked for their plan of action another official said, “We have the resources available for utilisation. There are four parking zones which are Shivaji Stadium, DlF Palika and Baba Kharak Singh Marg.”
Park & ride facility will be available, says NDMC. The idea has been mooted to make CP as pedestrian friendly as that would also help in reducing pollutants in the air quality. As if polluted air from nearby congested areas like ITO, New Delhi Railway Station, Jhandewalan and Paharganj will confront an invisible wall when it reaches CP!
According to the officials in the NDMC, the plan envisaged for the making CP pedestrian friendly will be implemented with vehicular restrictions. Traffic entering the inner circle will be diverted towards Ranjit Singh Road flyover. “The entry gate to Palika parking can also be changed. Palika multi-level parking has a capacity of some 1408 vehicles. Plan is afoot to provide a gate for parking since the vehicles will be banned from entering the inner circle, said an official.
The project was discussed on January 5 this year in a meeting of NDMC officials, chaired by Union Urban Development Minister Venkaiah Naidu. And it was officially announced that to make Connaught Place area pedestrian friendly, cars and buses will not be allowed in the middle and inner circle.
Meanwhile, UDM officials claimed that the three-month “pedestrianisation” of the area, which has the city’s most recognisable heritage structures, will test the effects on traffic, management of reclaimed parking lots, and record the experience of the pedestrians and shop owners.
Earlier, NDMC chairman Naresh Kumar in a press statement had said that the ban is part of a pilot smart city project that will be launched next month. As part of the project, the imposing commercial area built by Edwin lutyens in 1933 will be barred to traffic from February 1 for the next three months. Officials say they will analyse the data and then take the final call whether to continue with this plan or drop it. We hope good sense prevails!
