Stop Central Vista Project, build hospitals

Mohammed Wajihuddin Amidst India’s worst health crises, the Centre is coming up with a powerful politician’s pet project–the Central Vista Redevelopment Project (CVRP)–in the heart of Lutyens’ Delhi. To be prepared at Rs 20, 000 crore, the project will have a new Parliament House, a new residence for the PM, a new residence and office for the Vice-President and a Central Secretariat housing all the ministries. The existing British-era Parliament House which is not even a century old and is in good condition will be turned into a museum. So will be the North and South  blocks. The old Raisina Hill, where the massive, glittering complex is coming up, will never be the same again.
As India gasps for breath and the devastating pandemic-related deaths pile up, massive earth movers, giant drilling machines and other tools hungrily hollow out the solid surface between the iconic Rashtrapati Bhavan and the historic India Gate. According to one report, around 4000 ancient trees have already been cut to make space for the vanity project.
What should be the country’s priorities today? It should be to provide medical oxygen, beds and ventilators and more ICUs at hospitals. Because every life matters. Because life is precious. Allowing the people to die for want of oxygen and good hospitals and building a mega project which is not essential is a joke on the over one billion people of India. If you can’t give them oxygen and life-saving drugs, don’t rub salt into their wounds.
Many mediaeval monarchs and emperors became megalomaniacs because they wrongly believed they had divine rights to rule and do whatever they or their slavish coterie of advisors thought was right. They wanted posterity to remember them through buildings and monuments. They built opulent palaces and, since they lived in eternal fear of invasion from enemies, they fortified their seats of power. To many, building mahals and mausoleums were more important than building schools, colleges and universities. Instead of investing in research and discoveries that could have helped advance human civilisation, they filled stables with some of the costliest and fastest horses and harems with beauties. They exploited men and women both and whoever raised a finger had to rot in prison or face the firing squad.
Instead of investing in making life comfortable for the masses, these royals spent shamelessly on the ostentatious living quarters for themselves and their kith and kin. The gap between living standards of the royals and the rayots was gigantic. Many of the once splendid palaces, naubat khanas , mahals and qilas are ruins today. They suffer official apathy and criminal indifference from the agencies tasked to take care of them. Rulers with sense of public welfare are remembered with respect. Megalomaniacs with huge egos and short vision get tossed off the pedestals easily.
But here the purpose is not so much to improve the seating capacity in the Parliament House or the Central Secretariat as it is to assert the “coming of age” of the new rulers. It is to announce the shedding of the “periods of slavery” and arrival of a new era of majoritarian rule.