Mumbai: still moving

You can’t keep a good city down. Mumbai emerged from its recent trial by water, somewhat dishevelled, but with its spirit intact. Citie...

You can’t keep a good city down. Mumbai emerged from its recent trial by water, somewhat dishevelled, but with its spirit intact. Cities, the wise say, should be walled with the courage of its inhabitants and the Mumbaikar has displayed this quality in abundant measure, time and again, recovering with alacrity from reversals of every kind: riots and bomb blasts; building collapses and fires; and, of course, floods.

This visitation of water is an annual feature and should have prompted a more effective response from the city’s guardians. Although there has been much talk of a Disaster Plan for the city, another disaster

came along this time and found the metropolis’s politicians and bureaucrats without a clue on how to address it. As usual. There was not even the mandatory purveying of information, through television, radio and cellphones, to desperate people marooned on highways and office buildings. The only message that Mantralaya could send out was a familiar one to the city resident: kindly adjust. The point, of course, was that the Mumbaikar did not need to be told this. “Adjusting” has become something of a survival instinct. Wading through waist deep water, inching one’s way through roads that had turned into rivers, forgetting all about a warm dinner or a cosy bed, lending a helping hand to others like them — it was all part of a day’s work.

This saga of endurance in the face of uncertainty is inspiring. It also tells us why Mumbai is the country’s symbol of social bonding and financial enterprise. Come hell or high water, this city never stops.