Who Are the Custodians of Our Public Property?

To my readers, the somewhat confusing title of the article may be apparent as the public property is supposed to be owned by the people in general. But if you care to take a hard look at the state of our public property you would shocked beyond your wits!

Now let us consider and address the question: What is public property? The roads, pavements, parks , open spaces, wetlands and water bodies which are not in private possession should obviously come within the ambit of it. The ownership,management and maintenance of these public assets which are created out of taxpayers' money are in the hands of the governments , municipal corporations or bodies and panchayats at the lowest level. And the record of these agencies which are supposed to take care of these assets is just horrible. Beginning with our roads, all the roads in cites in India rather strangely came up after physical construction of buildings and houses which too came up in a haphazard and unplanned way. These roads are very narrow and do not have pavements for the pedestrians. Any thought of taking a stroll along it is a daunting one . And the roads which have pavements have been taken over by the hawkers thanks to an unholy nexus among the hawkers, the local police and the local administration.

Now coming to our parks and open spaces, these are places which can be described to be the lungs of any city. And the culpable neglect and dereliction of duty of the these agencies have turned these places into breeding grounds of all kinds of vices. Some of the parks have become notorious and you have to be extraordinarily intrepid to contemplate an evening walk to relax your weary mind and tired body as the control of these parks pass into the hands of drug peddlars and other anti-social elements.

Last but not least comes the construction places of worship at road crossings! Why these crossings attract so much attention of the God-loving people? The reason is not too far too seek. These are clever devices employed by the people who have nothing to do with religion to make a tidy packet by exploiting religious sentiments of the gullible people.