Just as we sit down to study, the sound of heavy machinery pierces through the air. There seems to be little respite from the loud noise and the banging sound. Sadly, even as the evening settles, the intense drilling does not. Nor does the air pollution. Gone are the winter months, when weather phenomena were blamed for poor air quality. Whether vehicular pollution or construction dust, it seems we are condemned to breathe air laden with particulate matter that plays havoc on our health. Even the wind that blows on warm summer days and nights, which would normally delight us, is more of a mini sand storm, filling our nostrils with construction dust.
If this isn’t enough, the construction material lying in front of construction sites makes walking a living nightmare. One can easily get injured by the sariyas and other such material spread carelessly on the road. Besides encroaching on already constricted road space, we struggle to walk while avoiding vehicles as no pavements exist. Whatever pavements exist are either part of a huge ramp in front of houses, cars parked outside when they can easily be adjusted in the driveways, or pots placed by residents.
If the front lanes are bad, the back lanes are deplorable. Full of construction waste, illegal enclosures with toilets that are never clean, and an all-pervasive stench, these lanes are certainly not for the weak-hearted. Not to mention the mosquito menace that emerges from such breeding grounds.
When with great difficulty and perseverance the government does make the roads, the heavy machinery such as JCBs ensure that they don’t last long. Even road cutting is indulged in repeatedly, with impunity, without any botheration of any permission or consequences.
It seems that building norms exist only for textbooks, to be flouted openly, repeatedly, without fear or care. But it is high time that the people involved in construction industry, whether they be contractors, builders or even home-owners doing renovations, be made accountable for the amount of inconvenience they cause to each one of us. They must be made to adhere to rules and regulations laid down, else strict action must be taken.
It does not matter whether it’s the government or the RWA, its time that we say its our lives and our lives matter. At every such incidence of violation, there must be consequences, and those consequences must be suffered by those indulging in violation, and not victims like us.
