WHEN IT RAINS (IN MUMBAI)

Dreams seem to come true in this city. People throng in to this place in search of wealth, love, home, family, destiny and what not. Every morning the long distance trains that enters Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus in Mumbai carries in them dreamers who are here to make it big. Their excitements know no limits once their feet kiss the ground beneath. Tears ooze out of the sleepless eyes to see the city they had longed for after being subjected to a series of movies made in Bollywood. Every hero who comes from a village turns big in this city. And almost every Bollywood movie has a rain sequence. Speaking about rains, Mumbai is unimaginable without its share of monsoons.

Last week, I was extremely thrilled to witness a Punjabi family that was here from US to enjoy the first few drops of rains. Marine Drive is enjoyable and so is the Worli sea face. Rains intrigue passion. And rains power the romance between two sweethearts. But with every monsoon shower that raids the city between June to September and sometimes beyond makes one wonder about how to manage it. Presently Mumbai has become extremely unmanageable during monsoons. Memories of a deluged July 26 have not yet faded from the minds of many Mumbaikars who were either stranded out of their homes or had lost everything to the waters that entered their homes and from homes to their lives and from their lives to their future.

Today the moment, it starts raining panic sets in. The first thing that goes haywire is our largest network of railways. It has been happening for a long time and authorities have been turning a blind eye towards it with a shameless smile on their thrash worthy faces. Overhead wires break off. Signals start malfunctioning. Indicators go berserk. During evenings most of the railway platforms witness a black out. Tracks are waterlogged and all you can see are hordes and hordes of people waiting for their train to arrive.

Accidents too are frequent. Roads wear a dreaded look. Potholes, manholes and every possible hole remain submerged under water. The one’s who are cautious are any ways saved. And the one’s who tend to take it a little casually has to end up paying a price of a princely nature. Sometimes life is also at stake.

Every since July 26 deluge shook the chairs beneath the red taped bureaucrats they converged some of the most destructive minds. These minds were already sick enough. But they did one good thing. All of them arrived on the banks of Mithi River and declared the once freely flowing water body the main villain behind the submergence of Mumbai. We, the people foolishly accepted their verdict and from time to time kept checking the status of how much Mithi was finally cleaned. The cost of cleaning kept increasing. Slums were uprooted. People were dislocated and Mithi was considered the root cause of Mumbai facing flash floods. But does Mithi flow around places like Thane, Vashi, Mulund, Bhandup, Ghatkopar, Kandivili, Borivili, Andheri or say Lower Parel? No!

The funniest of all during Mumbai monsoons are the uncountable news channels. A reporter or a group of reporters specially get appointed to stand in knee height dirty waters near Milan subway. The entire world by now knows that the moment Milan subway goes under water, Mumbai is finished. The world is being made an audience to this hara-kiri of very Indian flavour.

For once, it is important to think as to how and why the once enjoyable Mumbai Monsoon has suddenly transformed into a nightmare or a dreaded natural calamity. No! There is no use going to the politicians. In stead given a chance, every politician should be kicked on their butts and straight into the Mithi River. If some one is really thinking of questioning the municipal authorities, don’t be surprised to see how bad they are at crisis management. They have all been given a crash course on ‘Mithi is the Real Villain’ topic. Since I travel a lot and the local train is my safest mode of transport, I frequently come face to face with such municipal authorities. When I cross question them, the reply they have is – what have we got to do with Mother Nature’s fury? Monsoon comes, it goes. We get our salaries on time. Let the world go into a big black hole.

Mumbai sinks every year. Ten to 50 Mumbaites die every year. Five to 10 Mumbaites go missing every year. When it rains (in Mumbai), peace goes on a vacation every year. Save Mumbai by saying no to those sick plastic bags, this is the root cause of all. And avoid decorating the drains by secretly dumping them with garbage.

I love Mumbai. If you do, move your lazy butts a bit to do your bit!

Or else when it again rains (in Mumbai), we will have to see it somewhere up there because by then we would have been a victim of a manhole kept open mistakenly.

- vociferous