mid-day editorial: Pay attention to the basic infrastructure

Carcasses of animals dumped along the Mumbai-Nashik highway, are creating unhygienic conditions and suffusing the area with a strong stench, this paper reported

Carcasses of animals dumped along the Mumbai-Nashik highway, are creating unhygienic conditions and suffusing the area with a strong stench, this paper reported. The story cited a Bandra resident, who is a frequent traveller on the stretch, who approached the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) informing them about the carcasses dumped along the road. She also said that emergency numbers on boards on the stretch have become unreadable.

First up, it is not tenable that carcasses lie on this stretch with nobody taking onus of the issue or bothering to clean it up. This busy stretch needs to be cleaned and sanitised every few days so that motorists do not have to drive down in appalling conditions. This will also become a breeding ground for disease and one should not be surprised if locals living near the highways or even those who commute on this network with some frequency fall prey to some outbreak or the other.

We are living in a time when different authorities have pressed the accelerator in terms of environment and cleanliness. Let the accent on these two aspects of life be real and practical rather than feel good phrases or simply cocktail chatter, to be bandied about along with finger food. Make that Swachch Bharat Abhiyaan count in real ways. Make go green more than a mantra.

It is no use dropping catchphrases like Smart Cities and super highways if this is the state of existent infrastructure. Do not build new infra and let the old one be in a shabby, neglected state. Legible, well-demarcated signboards, lights, smoother roads, speed breakers at certain spots, emergency numbers that work and of course, cleanliness, is part of a world class network of commuting infra. If India aspires to join that club, let us pay attention to basics.

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