Mumbai is a cash cow that’s pleading for protection and 'charity'
Pooja Bedi
The centre has turned down the Chief Ministers' request for funds to
better our city. It is ironical that we are beggars at a budget banquet
funded mostly by us. Mumbai puts out over 40% of this country's taxes
and I find it offensive that when we ask for a paltry percentage of it
to better our surroundings and living conditions, the demand be rejected.
We need infrastructure, highways, sanitation, sea links, garbage
disposal and waste management systems, our local authorities and forces
need better equipment, arms and technology and by Mr RR Patil’s own
admission 55,000 more police. We need money to spend on upgrading
existing public facilities, recreational areas, to have better and
faster courts, and to pay for competent judges. There is a lovely quote:
'Give me a fish, I eat for a day, teach me to fish and I eat for a
lifetime.' Well, we Mumbaiites fish. Not only are we earning for
ourselves, but also for most of the country that doesn’t. But we have
become a cash cow that is just milked and left to starve in unhygienic
squalor.
Or maybe I should liken Mumbai to a typical sweet, taken for granted
bahu who serves the entire family, is mistreated and bullied but takes
aggression in silence, in her stride, and continues to selflessly give
of herself because she considers her function as her Karma and Dharma?
cont'd....
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1802310.cms