Iodex for a Brain Tumour

Maharashtra’s CM and deputy CM want their hoardings removed. Let no one clap.

One of the great misfortunes of Maharashtra is that it is next door to Gujarat. While in Narendra Modi’s government, bureaucrats have express instructions to find ways to get a file passed, in Maharashtra the first instinct is to stall it. It’s also no secret that in Mantralaya, the seat of Maharashtra’s government, there’s a price on signatures in a file. It’s a business largely driven by the construction industry. Ask anyone who has dealings with the Maharashtra government and he’ll tell you that this is also a state in love with announcing programmes. One exasperated person who worked with a quasi government economic body says, “It is incredible how guiltless they are about calling press conferences, talking about something they plan to do, and then forgetting about it.”

In a state so administratively rotten to the core, Prithviraj Chavan’s order that all hoardings congratulating him should be removed is tokenism at its insipid best. Leave aside the fact that it makes absolutely no difference to the people. But if these hoardings have broken a law (on what grounds otherwise can he ask for them to be removed?), where’s the punishment for it?

Soon after Prithviraj Chavan, there was Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar. The newspaper DNA had a report quoting Mumbai’s municipal commissioner Swadhin Kshatriya saying, “…we got a call from Deputy CM Ajit Pawar, asking us to remove all illegal hoardings and banners welcoming him as the new Deputy CM. In the last two days, we have removed 3,400 hoardings.” In a well-run private company, this statement would be enough to sack Kshatriya. He’s confessing to many things: that there were 3,400 illegal hoardings during his watch; that he was unaware of them or did nothing (in other words ‘I am incompetent’); that someone needs to tell him how to do his job; that when someone else tells him what to do, he can actually do it; and by virtue of all of the above, he’ll never do his job until someone else tells him to do it.

Often it is said about African nations like Congo that the reason they degenerate into chaos is not because they are poor but because they are extremely rich in natural resources. Every group wants its hands on it. In Maharashtra’s case, it is Mumbai’s enormous riches. Removing hoardings there is like applying Iodex for a brain tumour.