India shining was the tagline of a political party which never got to see the shining side and is now trying hard to regroup itself into a force that it was in the late 90's and early 2000's but this makes us ponder on the question is INDIA the country that is shining really or is it a percentage of our population that is shining!!!
2000 has been an era where mobile phones have become an inseparable part of every human being and with that came a phenomenon called offer on phones which most of the times by some sheer luck seem to keep selecting you for all those unlimited life time free credit cards, pre-approved loans of 5 lakhs and 10 lakhs which makes you think is there something called credit history or financials verification for it also happens that you get a preapproved loan when you are in college. Walk into any shop selling anything from a simple Toothbrush to a Mercedes you can be rest assured that there will be some finance company representative who will be most willing to offer you a commercial loan at ZERO percent interest of all things.
This has now created a new class in Indian economy. Middle (Personal Loan/Commercial Loan) class who have access to all the things which our parents would have thought a lot before procuring just because in those days people thought a lot about necessity of everything in life and if sure would buy that out of savings in bank accounts rather than swipe a credit card or issue 8 post dated checks and bingo get a loan. You go anywhere nowadays and you see people owning more than one car per household. The bigger the car the better in terms of showcasing it amongst friends circle. We grew up seeing Ambassador cars and Premier PAL Padmini moving around with the rich class and the uber rich will move around in a Contessa Classic. Commuting to work or market was a joy ride and people entered office in mornings with a fresh, gleaming face and also returned home ready to go out again after having a cup of Tea or Coffee.
Today you get to see people families buying a Nano not because they don't have money and are upgrading from a two wheeler to a four wheeler safer for the family as envisaged and marketed by Tata's. Many are buying a Nano and the reason is its smaller and hence easier to move around withing City limits. For highways and longdrives we already have a SUV and there are also 2 or 3 Sedans in case. Commuting to work everyday has become a big assignment in itself. You leave at seven or eight or nine rest assured you can listen in to atleast two back to back programmes on your favourite fm channel as what else can one do when you are stuck in a traffic where the vehicle in front is moving at 2 kilometers per hour and there is no room to even open your door. Everyone from those in Santros to Vernas, Indicas to Ventures, Etios to Camry or Swaraj Mazda to Volvo's everyone is moving at a snails pace. Only the two wheeler drivers are moving ahead zig zagging between stationaru four wheelers and six wheelers.
If this aint enough then there is our government departments who take special pleasure in digging and digging the same stretch of road especially before and during monsoons and thereby adding to the existing traffic chaos by necessitating many diversions and one way traffic flows. While we are always blaming our Government for all these problems and not providing enough infrastructure have we ever thought how many people actually travel in each of these cars. You are struck in traffic and you can see only one person driving a Civic or a Corolla and looking at others with an aggrieved look as if he has nothing to do with the situation around except being a victim of choking infrastructure.
Why are we Indians so obsessed with the phenomenon of showing how rich we are. When we can commute to work in a office shuttle or car pool we would prefer driving a safari or scorpio all the way blocking the road and burning up already scarce fuel. Bigger the car bigger is our ego and we drive with a feeling that the whole road belongs to me and how can small cars or worst two wheelers ever drive on the same road so I would keep honking my horns to show how educated i am. This panacea can be cured or atleast some revenue earned to spend on infrastructure by bringing in a system wherein during pre determined peak hour certain stretches of road where there is more density of traffic the government imposes congestion charges on such vehicle owners if they want to show around really how rich they are. Having read recent articles where people have commented that they wont think twice before spending 10 million on a music system because they own a SUV worth 70 - 80 million will for sure pay up the additional congestion charge as it doesnt make any difference to them. Yes, the congestion charge will for sure be detrimental to those people who have bought a car on monthly emi's and are driving the car to work more out of pride than necessity or habit.
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