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Out of sight, out of mind?
Written By tsubba - 10 August, 2008
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If the middle class lives in
secure communities, then how will things improve?
If the movers and shakers opt
out
of sharing the problem that everyone else is facing, how will things
improve?
When the middle class
evacuates a
sphere, like education, or healthcare, doesn’t it go to the dogs?
These are a set of questions asked in an outlook article on gated communities. I have attached RK Mishra's take on these questions. But, beyond his opinions, what do you think? This by itself is a loaded question, but let us extend this beyond gated communities and ask similar questions about SEZ's and satellite towns. If industry and enterprise go to exclusive enclaves, will not the city go to the dogs?
Or is this all so much more theory? Or is it? To be part of the solution, do you have to be part of the problem?
Bangalore
Bangalore's Premium Gated Community
pics: fabalaTD
R.K. Misra, winner of the Times of India’s Lead India contest, is a resident of Palm Meadows, Bangalore’s most exclusive gated community. Excerpts from an interview with Outlook:
If the middle class lives in secure communities, then how will things improve? They are paying taxes. They are not getting away from their social responsibilities. The only thing is, they are taking less (from the state).
Aren’t you buying your way out of an urban mess? In a way, yes. But if you say, don’t buy out, I reject that. That’s socialist thinking, I don’t believe in it. This could be a model. In fact, you should talk to the politicians. Why can’t they make this a model for the rest of the city?
If the movers and shakers opt out of sharing the problem that everyone else is facing, how will things improve? I totally agree. At our community’s association meeting, I had brought a proposal that a certain amount of our corpus should be kept, five per cent or ten per cent, and we have a huge amount of money, for the things outside of Palm Meadows. It was shot down—because it was felt the association has been elected to take care of the interests of the community and should not do anything outside. The people who have bought their way into this comfort, they are very insensitive. You are talking to an example who is trying to do something. I shouted at people and stormed out. People have become so selfish that when they get in through the gate they behave like kings. They don’t realise there is resentment.
If that is how they behave, then don’t you think gated communities are a bad idea? See it is human nature. If I can afford it, I will have it. You can say it’s right, or it’s wrong. You cannot deny people their comfort, if they can afford it.... But I totally agree that gated communities are creating a divide.
When the middle class evacuates a sphere, like education, or healthcare, doesn’t it go to the dogs? I think you have a point, but the middle class has fled, not by its choice. It was forced. The outcome of this is bad, because if I am happy, my threshold is higher, I will not complain that much.... Ninety per cent people don’t do anything. In fact, people here (in Palm Meadows) are just busy counting money. They talk more about Obama than what is happening on July 22 (the day of the trust vote). I am telling you. I am really fed up of this community, and sometimes I wonder, am I getting the right kind of company for my kids?
So why are you living here? I am not brave enough to be living on a street where I have to face all sorts of.... I mean, you know you cannot get out of your house in Bangalore. Because of stray dogs you cannot walk. Water comes once in three days. Power goes six hours a day. Here at least I can control the environment where I want to live. I can afford it, and I don’t feel guilty because I have done enough. Ninety-nine per cent have not done, and what you are saying applies very clearly to them.
COMMENTS
nikunj946 - 18 August, 2008 - 19:57
I respect the views of everyone who have shared above. I can understand the anger over losing a possession in the name of socialism. As Mruli sir points out very nicely, what we have is not 'socialism'. We can call it anything else - corruption and at times populist measures where rather than creating equal opportunity to self-empower people are given symbolic alms (blrpraj puts it metaphorically above - feed a fish to a hungry guy who doesn't know how to fish, he will come back hungry again; but if you help him initially and teach him how to fish he will most likely not go hungry for the rest of his life).
But what we have now is not socialism. Its a socio-political cancer. As Syed said 'we are very much a part of the system' and change is best when it moves from within out rather than otherway round.
Mruli sir is right in pointing that a huge majority of us are socialists at core (if not we would be busy making money). The winds of change can be felt. From individual acts to work done by NGOs, but it still lacks a kick. For real change we need gale force winds. For real change we need to leave our comfort zones.
When I first started with my handycam producing the driver education videos, I thought I will have help from people I know. Most people communicated I was mad (becoming a social worker) and wasting time 'nothing in India will change'. It was not very comfortable, I persisted and I am glad I did so.
But now I ask myself what will be the most discomforting thing to do. Will I have the courage to do a Prince Siddhartha? Leave my job, enter politics - the ultimate peak discomfort as far as a middle class intellectual is concerned?
I invite everyone to try and imagine what Bangalore / Mysore / Pune city administrations and governance will be like when half of Praja members were to become the sitting corporators? What would our cities look like with regards the landscape, pavements, availability of dustbins, dedicated hawking zones, reliable public transport.......................
IMAGINE
ASJ
silkboard - 11 August, 2008 - 03:30
The offices where many young middle class Bangaloreans work in - air-conditioned, 24/7 power backup, drinking water on tap - do those qualify to be called "shells"?
The apartment complexes themselves, with private amenities at par with 'gated communities', just that these are pool of apartments, not houses. Scant respect for parking related byelaws (many of them), some with huge borewells to draw 'public' water, nice lawns inside the apartment complexes, and same rotten pavements and roads just as you step outside. Will these complexes qualify as "shells"?
Let us move on to controversial grounds. What about average middle class house (house on a plot, of old Bangalore, or of small cities where so many of us have grown up)? Don't we take super extra care of them, and mostly disrespected the surroundings? Raise your hand if you ever saw your family members or maid sweep the dust from your house only to throw it right outside, either on the road or in a neighboring compound, as long as it fell outside your "boundary"? How many of these houses do we see building car parking ports now, but not doing their bit to pave the roadside footpath right outside their houses? Would you call our selfish livings inside these houses also as cases of "shell"?
How about traveling in air-conditioned coaches instead of old styled open 3-tier ones? Are those closed bogeys also fit to be called "shells"?
What about cars themselves? buying our way out of messy public transport instead of 'mingling' and working 'on it' - does this also amount to building a "shell" for yourself?
It does feel like living in a virtual world at times. Depart from a nice community; in an air-conditioned car; dropped directly at a nice airport. On to a plane, another airport, then another taxi, and to another air conditioned office with power backup.
Some of us add a bit of 'mingling' to this. Replace the cabs with Vaayu Vajra almost every time except late night international flights. Autorickshaw in other cities wherever possible - taken purely to get a chance to talk to the driver, and enjoy the smoke, soot and polluted air.
Back to the original topic posted by Tarle, the thing is - Community living is the answer, not a problem. There will be tiers here, depending on affordability. But the thing is, affordability increases when you pool energies. Refer to this old post - middle class slums. The only way to get out of that mess (which wasn't a problem two decades ago) is to pool your resources.
- Join ten 30x40 plots. You get 12000 sqft of land
- Assuming FAR of 3, you can build 36000 sqft on this plot
- Take 2000 sqft for each family that pooled in, 20000 gone, you get 16000 sqft free
- Use this for your car park. Or for a community hall.
- Or just build a little less, leave space for lawns or amenities on ground or on top floor.
This sort of thing should be incentivized, you make at least a dozen families rub shoulders with each other, and they make do with less resources - no separate UPS'es wasting energy, no separate water tanks getting replenished everyday wasting hundreds of liters of water every other day. No fighting over who parks his car on what stretch of narrow 10-12 feet public lane. The best thing is - for any civic issue, they argue their cases together - with BBMP, BESCOM or whatever.
back to the original topic of this thread...
blrpraj - 15 August, 2008 - 07:17
Coming back to the thread's original question of what we think about gated communities. Such things existed before in different forms. Back in Chennai where I grew up there were flats in a nearby locality where some friends lived. If I had to get in I had to get past watchmen and guard dogs after registering my name and telling them whom I am visiting. What else were houses in Sadashiv nagar of Bangalore with 10plus feet walls, alsation dogs and guards? I remember eating lunch with my colleagues in Jayanagar in a park and observed a house that looked like a fortress, a black gate with high walls and guards (from what I recall it is a famous Kannada actor's house and it is next to a school..can't remember the name of the actor). The only difference now is that the same compound has grown much bigger with more facilities and more people are living there in multiple homes.
Like I said before what would be bad about gated communities is if they were built by greasing hands and violating laws. Another problem with the Indian version of gated communities would be if the homeowner's association took the law into their own hands..and let's say..bashed me up if I strayed there wearing hawai chappals and a not so good looking jeans/lungi just because I seemed shady :-).
I don't quite understand nor agree with the interviewers line of questioning of "If the movers and shakers opt out of sharing the problem that everyone else is facing, how will things improve?" From what I have read from other articles, there a quite a few techies who live there. I am sure quite a bunch of those techies grew up in middle class families and faced a lot of the problems that everyone of us faces before making the full circle back to Bangalore via whatever country they stayed in. A lot of folks would have worked their bu** off to make that money & I don't have a problem. But, I do have a problem if they misuse their power, status & money to get away with breaking laws. Let's face it, neither the inverviewer nor most of us are going to voluntarily live in slums or extremely poverty stricken areas (no offence inteded to anybody please) just to opt in and prove a point and share the problems. Believe me, the problems of people living in those areas are so acute our problems may pale in comparison. I think it is wrong to judge that a person is indifferent or not caring about such things just because that person may be driving a car and living in an upscale house. Agreed many are selfish, but quite a few are giving back to the community in different forms; R.K. Misra's effort to have the home owners mark some funds for outside development itself shows. I think, at the end of the day there are many positives that can be taken away as well from these communities in terms of orderly development. Why can't all localities be modeled on such stanard lines? Are we associating clean orderly streets and organized development only with being rich? That is the shell the country at a large needs to get out of.
R.K Misra in that outlook article has referred to how selfish people have become...here is a first hand story..in R.T Nagar when a garbage collection drive was being put together people were reluctant to part with a nominal amount per month. There are many such instances where rich,middle class and lower middle class alike don't want to part with money..but on the other hand..(again with no offence intended to anybody..I am just pointing out one aspect)..folks are willing to part with money for religious reasons at the bat of an eyelid -> as of Sept 2007 Tirupati's annual income is reportedly upto Rs. 750 crores (anywhere between 175 to 200 million dollars roughly) all of this from generous contributions (rich,poor and middle class alike). Plus read this - http://www1.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Cities/Hyderabad/Tirupati_trust_owes_crores_as_tax_to_govt/articleshow/3331338.cms
I know this is off topic, but all I am saying is that when we can raise such money voluntarily, then why is it so difficult to take ownership of our individual communities and raise money for development? I guess our priorities are wron sometimes. Good things about the new gates communities can be factored in and the bad things left out and an overall standarsized developmental approach can be developed.
Sorry for the rant guys..I just wanted to speak out my mind and again no offence intended to anybody 
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