Is it time to close down cities and go home?

Once equated with progress, cities across the globe are having a hard time, especially in times of a pandemic that spares none. From the high and the mighty to the beggar on the street, no one is immune to the dreaded COVID-19. We have seen the best-laid plans of humans in every walk of life, from healthcare to commerce to governance crumble before the advent of the virus.

Take a moment and think of life in a city even during the so-called normal times. With space shortage in every sphere of human activity, people tend to live cheek-by-jowl in small apartment blocks and spend half their life commuting to work over long distances. The office itself, more often than not, is little more than a cubicle despite the glass frontage and other decorations. At the end of the day, you return home, have dinner and crash out on the bed.

Circumstance may vary according to your social and economic status. The 'lucky' few may be able to afford a penthouse in a gated community and pretend to be living in heaven. But the minute you step out, reality hits in the form of poor infrastructure by way of roads, unplanned slum areas and the bane of pollution. You cannot even seem to remember when you have last seen a deep blue sky, except in tourism posters or drank water from a well or straight from the tap.

Into such a scenario comes a virus, named corona by medical researchers in the 1960s. Peering through the microscopes of those days, they just about managed to see the blighter with some pointy things sticking out all over, resembling the coronet  (https://bit.ly/39N9nN5). However, several decades down the line, with advanced microscopes, they now say the virus resembles a World War II mines that sank many a ship at sea. Have a look at one of these blighters (https://bit.ly/30iRgeF).

Well, there you have it. Apart from the potholes on the road, lunatic drivers, dogs, cows and jaywalkers, you have to deal with a damn virus too. So, what do you do? Draw up plan A, B, C and D. The first one is to stay home, ask the office to give you a work from home option. The second is to hotfoot it home to your 'native' village if you have one.

Suddenly, you find that the old ancestral house that you were willing to sell to the first 'developer' who asks for it without a second thought quite a nice place to stay in. Just fix the bathrooms by putting in some nice bathroom tiles (obviously) get an internet connection, cable TV and you are set up for life.

None of the commuting hassles for you. Get up at a suitable time, draw water from the well for a refreshing bath and exercising your muscles in the process. The pump set has robbed most of us of this pleasure. For those of you with a pond or river in the neighbourhood, you have another option provided that there is water available and is clean enough for a bath.

Start work after breakfast, lunch or dinner according to schedule and enjoy life.

Is it practical to return to roots?

Well, for those of you with some sort of connection with your village, it will work. In India, even villages are no less than urban areas in terms of network connectivity for the most part. Of course, there are places where neither BSNL nor God Almighty quite managed to get a signal in.

Among those affected by such changes would be the realty folks and the construction sector. Well, they could always adapt to new realities. Instead of building multi-storeyed apartment complexes that stick out like sore thumbs, for the most part, they can try something more habitable and in tune with nature.

Let there be more walkways and cycle tracks in pleasant leafy neighbourhoods for a down-to-earth healthy population. Instead of rabbit warren cityscape, let there be more open spaces both in mind and nature.

Designing Smart Cities

How do we design smart cities? Certainly not by building block after block of box-like office complexes and apartments, eight-lane roads and flyovers. Let there be more design as found in IIT or IIM campuses, acres of greenery, interspersed with residential and office buildings. Every facility should be within walking or cycling distance, eliminating the need for motorised transport.

Maximise the use of clean and renewable energy sources like solar and wind power while taking care to think of ways to dispose of spent batteries and other pollutants.

Invest in Clean Environment and People’s Health

Instead of a knee-jerk reaction to public health threats, invest in a health care system that takes care of the general health of people regardless of social or economic status. Bring back the family doctor concept than private-run super speciality hospitals running only on the profit motive.

Make the education system more practical to make students capable of developing pragmatic solutions to daily life problems. Religion should be a strictly personal affair away from public life. Religious ceremonies could be held and celebrated but not as something to show off power. Learn to appreciate diversity and let empathy, sympathy and kindness rule human life.