kya scene hai!

I was walking behind the office when I stopped to click this pic.

My colleague asked me what I was clicking – the Indian flag? Nopes. That’s just one of it. This photo has much more meaning than that. It is a long essay. You see the Indian Flag. It is on top of a defunct government company called the National Bicycle Corporation. The government post-independence set up the pillars or the temples of modern India in the form of state owned PSUs. These PSUs were all well-meaning but failed miserably to improve the quality of the Indian populace. They produced far less than  the demand. Everything was controlled. The state believed that they needed to control everything and all the resources so that they could efficiently allocate it all. As if it followed a neat mathematical model. That’s why waiting lists of a car were more than 5-6 years. Even scooters had hude waiting lists. The government produced stuff was of low quality and that of the limited private sector was too high on quality as well. Bajaj scooters was the largest in the country and he had a simple problem – he just couldn’t produce enough to fulfill demand. The shoddy scooters would often have a problem in starting. In fact people joked that they were made with tilt technology – you had to tilt them to get them to start. That way the petrol would get into the starter mechanism or something. But basically the Nehruvian dream of a well-planned state failed miserably. These dead buildings stand as a testimony to this.

On top of this dead building is the Indian flag. I guess there is enough budget or there must be an allocation of sorts for a flag that flies every day. There is no money to even repair the derelict building or the broken windows. In fact the broken windows story made famous by Malcolm Gladwell should  make for an interesting  reference point. The flag and the building make for this interesting contrast and tell a tale of corruption, lack of incentive, failure of planning and failure of ideals imposed.

In contrast what you see behind is the failure and success of a liberal economy. The success is simpler to see. These big massive buildings were only possible thanks to an increase in demand that liberalization through to India. Private builders can come in and get in modern technology to build these massive marvels of engineering. These are not your simple structure. They are designed differently so that they are abel to take in the load, wind etc while giving maximum space to the realtor for sale. Even dreaming of these massive buildings are now possible – in the old era, there was a cement ministry. CEMENT…why would you ever need a minister in the Union Cabinet to regulate something as base as Cement. But that shows – how much cement was important in building Indian and how less of it we were producing. I remember growing up and people talking about cement scams and bridges falling down. In fact the iconic movie – Jaane bho do yarron was all about a bridge that was a source of scams and the dam thing falling. And these massive buildings are also possible thanks to another development. The Slum Rehabilitation Act. Here the builders are allowed to rehabilitate the slums in buildings he builds and then in the leftover land he can build massive towers with some crazy FSI (the amount of floor space he can make and sell). So this is transforming the landscape. At first the socialist side of India allowed these slums and squatters to come up and occupy land and now we have this gargantuan problem that we have solved using the ultimate capitalist idea. But on the other hand this has given rise to the ultimate scrooge of Capitalism – Crony Capitalism. “Crony capitalism is a term describing an economy in which success in business depends on close relationships between business people and government officials. It may be exhibited by favoritism in the distribution of legal permits, government grants, special tax breaks, or other forms of state interventionism.”  Possibly the most hated business in Mumbai would be the builder community. Besides being seen as a goon that over promises and under delivers, the buyers worry whenever someone is buying a flat is that how legit is the dam thing, even as it’s being built.  There are many cases of the building being built and then the government coming in to say that the dam thing must be demolished. Sometimes this can even take 20 years. The other one is the game on FSI. Earlier before the rules straightened out there were weird rules of FSI allowed. Things like parking or open refuge areas did not take up FSI. There were weird cases of builders giving car parks to all residents outside their house one their floors. Yes you read it right – you had a parking outside your house irrespective of the floor you stayed on. Even if you were on the tenth floor. Basically you get the plan passed and then you let the residents do what they want. Like convert that massive space into a living room. Or show awnings outside the house but build them using concrete so that the residents then use it as a gallery. Real stupid stuff, using stupid rules against the system itself.

But at least a few things are happening. The construction is happening on an advanced level with professionals as opposed to ill trained contractors. Better safety of workers with a lot of workers wearing proper clothing and protection and modern equipment like cranes and lifts. The construction site does seem far more organized, clean and process oriented. At least more than what it used to be.

So I like the shot of the old derelict PSU with the New Indian Flag in a case of misplaced jingoism, with two massive buildings coming up in the background which are done under the Slum Rehab Scheme with a professional private contractor doing what looks like a good job! What a story in one picture.