Delhi Needs A Royal Broom

SHE came, she saw and she complained: "Delhi is a dirty city." Yes, so said the 'disgusted' by 'dirty Delhi' Queen of Great Britain to Prime Minister Inder Gujral at a state banquet. The revealing royal observation, aides added, came in the wake of Elizabeth II's wreath-laying visit to Rajghat. Then, elaborating upon Her Majesty's sentiments, the British high commissioner to India reportedly explained: "You see people easing themselves on the streets."

 The comment, in turn, 'disgusted' Gujral, 'galvanised' him into 'action' and 'spurred' him into 'cleaning' the Capital. Or so screamed newspaper headlines. "All officers should be changed," the prime minister reportedly said, lambasting the local bureaucracy. "The Queen is here only for a short while and if she complains, it is disgusting." Yes, prime minister. Disgusting indeed. But no more disgusting than many other facts about the Capital. And surely, we don't need the Queen of England to educate us on these. Delhi has the shameful distinction of being the fourth most polluted city in the world, with state transport minister Rajendra Gupta having admitted to 7,500 deaths in 1996 due to pollution-related diseases. Add to that the heaps of filth that lie strewn all over the perpetually dug-up Delhi roads—part of the 5,000 tonnes of garbage generated daily in the city, with 40 per cent of it remaining uncleared.

There's more. Lots more in those squalid Delhi slums which saw an ugly rise in population from 18 lakh in 1981 to 32 lakh in 1991 and raring to add up a most shockingly huge number in 2001. As for that hideous sight of people relieving themselves out in the open in our historic city, well they can hardly help it. The last count had no more than 400 stomach-churningly dirty public urinals for a population of much over 10 million.

Disgusted? Not quite it would seem. Even as his office has been churning out press releases by the dozens on an intensive 'clean Delhi' drive launched by Delhi chief minister Sahib Singh Verma after the Queen's comment, when contacted by Outlook, Verma refused to admit to the squalor in the city. "Hundred per cent lies. All lies about Delhi being so dirty. The Queen never said Delhi was dirty. Neither did the PM. They only said Islamabad is very clean," he quibbled.

And does that change filthy ground reality? But not many among the politicians, it seems, want to address this question. The leader of the opposition in the Delhi Assembly, Jag Pravesh Chandra, waxes eloquent on the impropriety of the Queen's comments: "Elizabeth is very Churchillian in her attitude. Condescending to India and Indians. She had absolutely no business criticising the country that is playing host to her state visit. I mean, you don't tell people you are staying with that they have a filthy house."

Lessons in dirt-diplomacy apart, the unfortunate episode seems to have taught little to those who have the power to clean up. A few angry words at a high-powered meeting, lots of media management and an opportunity to point fingers at each other is all the Queen's comment has given occasion for. "The very fact that it took the Queen of England to tell Inder that the city is unclean for him to take note of the fact and do something about it is shocking. He's been here since the Partition and should have known how polluted the place is," says columnist Khushwant Singh. The smog that covers the city is killing, Singh points out. By way of solution, he suggests that the authorities clamp down on issuing fresh licences to cars. Also, a day of no automobile movement in the week, Singh feels, could reduce the pollution in the city. "It happens all over the world, why can't it happen here: because these effective but stringent methods will affect vote-banks."

SUFFERING Delhiites agree. "Huge slums in front of places like the posh Oberoi Hotel aren't touched because these unauthorised colonies bring in valid votes. So thousands are encouraged to slum it out. Let them live in dirt as long as they have the ability to vote people into power," says Saroj Tara, resident in south Delhi's Mandakini Enclave that has a huge slum in its neighbourhood.

An angry Ganesh Swami of Green Park observes that his locality can hardly be clean considering that all the municipality sweepers work at homes in the colony. "Keen on earning a quick buck by servicing private houses, they leave colony-cleaning till the day some higher-up is due to come for inspection."

 But these "inspections", says Delhi's Lt Governor Tejinder Khanna will be regularised and rigorous from now on. "Every Friday morning from 6.30 to 8.30, the chief minister and top officials, including me, will take rounds of the city. Accompanying photographers will give in pictures of any filth we encounter for tabulation into a database," Khanna says. An overhauling of work culture among those recruited to clean up, he says, is the only way to keep the city from being filthy.

Bureaucrat K.J. Alfons, who had launched a clean-Delhi drive when the plague hit the city in 1994, feels that nothing short of committed, confident and dynamic officers can alter the stinking scenario. "In that the PM rightly feels that the current lot in-charge of the situation should perhaps be changed. Someone with courage to erase unauthorised constructions—even the posh ones such as Sainik Farms—is required. Because these have no sewage facilities and are a strain to the sanitation system in the city." The Municipal Corporation of Delhi, the bureaucrat notes, has thousands of safai karamcharis and requires able administration to make them perform efficiently.

Environmentalist Ravi Aggarwal of Shrishti, a Delhi-based NGO that has authored many a report on the garbage management in the capital, feels that alternatives to a municipality system might ease the garbage disposal problem. "The system, bound by its traditions and rituals, cannot be improved beyond a point. The Central Pollution Control Board is already filing its report on Delhi to the Supreme Court every two months—that's about how focused it can get." The solution, Aggarwal feels, lies in looking into issues such as reworking the packaging and recycling sectors. "We have so many Delhiites calling us at a personal level and asking us for tips to clean up the mess in their colony. People want their city clean," the expert says.

Agreeing entirely, founder of Sulabh Sauchalaya, an organisation that has built over 3,000 public urinals all over the country and about 300 in the capital, Dr Bindeshwari Pathak, says: "Our scheme of charging Re 1 to those who use the toilet has worked out well. We use these funds towards maintenance of these toilets. People don't mind paying if it guarantees them cleanliness. The concept that India is dirty because Indians are dirty is so untrue." But Pathak does say that the bureaucracy in Delhi is the hardest to work with. "In no part of the country is it as difficult to work towards a sanitised city as here. And because of the officials not the people's desire to live in a clean city."

Well, high time then to lobby for a more livable Delhi. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II seems only too willing to be patron. Till, her next visit then. When she comes, she sees and she compliments: "Delhi is a clean city." That will make the prime minister happy. And Delhiites even more so.