Buck up Mumbai – World is moving very fast

And here I am not even talking about the world but our very own country and two other megapolis cities that I happened to travel over the last two weeks – our national capital New Delhi and the city of joy Kolkata.

Well New Delhi is a relatively newer city and parts of it, especially Lutyen’s Delhi, are very well planned and lush green. Plus it can now boast of an absolutely widespread and world class Metro network. But what surprised me this time was absolutely well laid out , layered , long and world class flyovers that could take you from one end of the city to another bypassing all intersections! As my itinerary included going from North-West Delhi to extreme south-East part (Noida) to central part ( Karol Bagh) to Airport to catch flight back home, I was a worried man. But I could do all these legs in virtually no time and that too in spite of my driver driving the car at a moderate speed in view of strict speed limit restrictions! Of course, Delhi’s Airport is amongst the best and the busiest in the world.

Kolkata used to be notorious for traffic jams and wayward driving. However, during my this visit, Airport to Salt Lake to the city centre ( Shakespeare Sarani) to back to Airport was absolutely smooth and glitch free through a combination of long flyovers, strict compliance with the traffic rules and one way traffic management. The city that boasted of the underground metro in the country is also further bolstering its metro network that’s clearly evident from large scale infrastructure development currently in progress.

On returning to our beloved city Mumbai, I was greeted by delayed arrival, thanks to the main runway that’s under repair till April, potholes ridden roads, indisciplined traffic clogging the entry points of all flyovers and frequent disruption in its infrastructure projects thanks to environmental and other issues.

Once the crown of the country, our beloved city badly needs a visionary ; Devendra Fadnavis came quite close to resolving these issues, but political ground realities have brought an abrupt end to his tenure. Let’s hope whosever heads the new Maharashtra government, he or she will rise above narrow politics to carry forward good work by Fadnavis.

Jai Maharashtra! Long live Mumbai!