Viva la Bandh!!!. Review on Mumbai

Hiya guys, this is an impromptu review, turning accepted viewpoints on their head and looking at the world through my eyes.

Everybody abuses a bandh, and todays newspapers also have given loss statistics. But I beg to differ.

This is not a review of Bombay, but rather a review of Bombay during a bandh. As I could not find a suitable category in MS to place this review, I was forced to put it here. Please forgive me this indiscretion and continue reading.

Just to give you a perspective about where I am coming from, yesterday was a Bharat Bandh called by the VHP and Bajrang Dal (two hard-core hindutva groups). But as any Indian knows, no bandh can even begin in Mumbai if the great tiger Balasaheb doesn't bless it (Shiv Sena - another Hindu group in Maharashtra). Well the Biggest B did grant his blessings and hence there was an almost total bandh on 26th.

Now why am I writing about this bandh??

Well.. in short because I loved the city yesterday. I saw a face of Mumbai that I had never before seen.. :-)

What am I talking about??

Ok, lets start at the beginning. I work in the treasury(derivatives) of HDFC Bank, and since the market normally remains open, I had to reach office any which way..this is the official reason. The real reason being: I am a bachelor and stay in a pad, w/o a TV/Comp etc..Office with all these luxuries is much more inviting, esp on a day when there is the potential to spend the whole day on MS, with no one complaining.... ahh what an inviting prospect... :-)

So yours truly, with great trepidation put his foot out of the house early in the morning, and immediately ran into that fast disappearing breed - a friendly Mumbaite. I mean the Auto guy was full of advise on how I should proceed (what would be the best route to Andheri station, inside info on the bandhs progress etc etc...)

I reached the station in 6 mins flat (normal time = 25 mins) I was totally amazed at the clean air (another fast disappearing commodity). But imagine my delight when I entered Andheri station....

For all non-mumbaites, this is one of Mumbai's biggest and busiest suburbs, where the normal(at peak time) length of queues at the ticket counter can stretch anywhere b/w 1/2 to 1 km. The normal procedure for getting into a train would be either to surrender oneself to a higher god and stay in front of the door, hoping to get pushed in or to imagine the Indo Pak border scenario and take evasive action, waiting for the gap in the enemy to launch oneself.

Either which way, by the time you enter the train, you feel like you have just rolled on the ground, fighting crocs, while trying to avoid bullets being fired from above... (For fuller details refer maddy's review Black Hole)..:-))

Well, yesterday, I walked up to the counter, waited with THREE, yes three other guys to pick up the ticket. Walked all the way to the platform. Strolled into a train (hang on, do not faint..it's true), strolled into a train and got a window seat (haha) facing the right direction (all mumbaites will imagine how difficult this is).. After which, among all the bonhomie and joi de vivre, all the passengers, numbering around 10-15 smiled at each other and began to seriously enjoy the ride..

Sounds incredible, right!! Wait it gets better.

Upon alighting at Mahalakshmi station, I realised that the taxis have quit for the day. Well I had a good 2/3 km walk ahead of me. Just as I was setting off, I was stopped by the friendly neighbourhood traffic cop(this breed imagined to be extinct is known to resurface rarely and only when least expected). He actually stopped a tempo trailer passing by and asked him to give a group of travellers(moi included) a lift to the next junction. Wow, convinced this had to be a dream, we boarded and managed to reduce the walk time.

Even the walk was refreshing as there was none of the normal pollution, traffic, honking and abuses. The drive back (another friendly lift), from Worli to Andheri took all of 14mins. Normal time 1.5 to 2 hrs. In fact people were actually smiling and waiting patiently at signals and the like... Mindblowing..

Well, thats about it regarding the bandh..

But the real reason for writing this review was not to present a day in my life. I want you to understand what the human being truly is capable of, left to his/her own devices. Like all others in big bad mumbai, I get caught up in the daily rat race which ends up consuming all my energy. But on a day like yesterday, I could see the potential for kindness inside each of us. Everyone was accommodating the other with a smile, and it was beautiful to see. Remember, I am not writing about the reasons for the bandh, but offering a window to another Mumbai... :-))

I do not have any illusion that this will continue for any time, but I thought that it needed to be said.

It was almost like post 9/11, when all the NYorkers suddenly looked at each other as fellow human beings. How to make it permanent?? I do not know, but I would love to hear your comments on this...

After all, each one of us together make up the teeming populace that enters this rat race daily... :-)

Cheers