I did not realise how fast time flies, and its been exactly a month since I started this blog. Mumbai elections happended and Baba Siddique won the Bandra seat yet another time (though I believe he was upset because he won with a small margin). Well, I am not sure if the results would have been different had a larger percentange of people voted. I wonder how many residents of Bandra actually read the Joint Election Manifesto issued by the Congress. The only reference I found to Bandra was to make Band-stand area into a tourist spot and shopping area. It also had usual jazz about improvement of 'Law & Order', Road Development etc.I know of people who came back from the pooling stations since the arrangements were not 'voter friendly'. Well, one might argue by saying that its irresponsible to do that etc. but the fact of the matter is urban life has become so challenging that we just look for ways to find time for ourselves (and our families). Therefore its the responsibility of the government and the think tanks to make it easier for the voters. We hope once Mr Nandan Nilekani's project is lauched it would be possible to vote sitting at home quite the way we do banking these days. "e-voting" - this idea has been around for many decades now, and i wonder why it has not gained populairty since i feel this is a sure way to get the urban mass to vote. With internet becoming so accessible, this is surely the way to go. There have been critisims about high risk of fraud, but lets not kid ourselves about the possibility of frauds in the current regime. If we can transact on the stock exchange, operate our bank accounts, pay bills et al using secure log in, I don't see why we cannot vote using secure log-in.
Having won the elections, I sincerely hope that some serious work by the Minister is done on two important aspect i.e. law and order and road / traffic. I feel Vandre (West) is choking on these two fronts. Bandra has surely become relatively a lot unsafe over the years. This perhaps could be the fall-out of popularity of the place, which I admit is the fall out of immigrants which whole of Mumbai faces. But imagine this, you walk out of HSBC ATM on Dr Ambedkar Road and you are mugged. Or, you go for dinner with your friends to Out of the Blue and you are attacked and your mobile phone, credit cards and cash are snatched away. And all these happening in the evening. Some say that there is a 'gang operating in Bandra, I am not sure and would not like to believe this. I don't know whether you have attempted to walk on Carter Road late evening (not on the promenade but the other side of the road), I get the same uncomfortable feeling as one gets in London tube late nights. Well you could call it globalisation but is this what we really want to adopt from the West.
I am confident that sooner or later our Ministers and Administrators would take note of all these and make Bandra a better place.
