EVEN as we say one another ‘A Happy New Year’, we also must ask ourselves a few questions at the start of the year 2026 -- about Nagpur and its upkeep and its public policy and about its civic administration (not administrators as persons). In other words, it is time we asked ourselves whether we really, really, really live in a livable city ! Of course, definitions differ -- from person to person, from political party to political party. But then, there are some standard definitions that are the same for all -- about whether Nagpur is a livable city or not, whether it is a clean city or not, whether it is really modern city or not, whether its public infrastructure is well designed or not... ! There could be innumerable questions, all right.

 

As free citizens of a free society, we have every right to ask questions and expect proper answers that show respect for our citizenship -- and not arrogance of the rulers. Of course, we must agree that most political leaders never take the arrogant course. They try to be polite and soft and tolerant. That is, of course, not unwelcome. The problem, however, is that the political leaders -- of any colour -- never offer clear answers. They prefer to be ambivalent -- so as to keep the common people guessing all the time. So, when a group of people approaches a political leader complaining bout badly-designed public infrastructure, the leader never displeases them and talks as softly as possible. But he does not offer a solution as well. Nagpurians have a clear experience of this sort of leadership. The loosefooter knows quite many groups of common people (and not just of activists) complaining about the damage the so-called development and beautification has caused to the Futala (Telangkhedi) Lake.

 

No political leader has shown a genuine interest in the complaint and has done little to sort out the problem. Similar experience is accrued when the people complain to political leaders about cement roads and side-walks not allowing the rainwater to flow into drains. The standard response is: ‘Let me see’. But nobody ‘sees’ -- neither the political leader nor the civic administration. The problem continues. All this affects badly the livability of the city of Nagpur. All this also makes the city’s so-called development as haphazard. For, all this comes in the realm of bad civic management. And nobody is bothered. No political leader entertains such issues.

 

Nobody in the civic administration finds himself or herself responsible or answerable when such issues often surface in the city’s public discourse. Therefore the need to ask questions -- particularly when the city will go to civic polls in the next fifteen days. Of course, none of us is naive to believe that correct answers would emerge. Yet, when people ask questions when the city is going to civic polls, at least some promises may emerge from the political segment -- while the administration would only shrug shoulders and say, in effect, that in a few days, ‘you would have an elected body. That will take care of things’. Wow ! And the loosefooter need not explain the exclamation. n