Thats what Delhi wants

I have been an avid reader of the Times and the Eco Times before Mint made me migrate from ET. However there was this interesting survey amongst Delhites that HT conducted along with another agency. Felt compelled to write my thoughts on the same.
http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/StoryPage.aspx?id=6b3c1530-26be-44f1-803f-4b297b025666

Delhi, the capital of India sees Paani, Sadak and Bijli in that order, to be the biggest electoral issues. Other issues such as security and environment do make it to the list at lower berths. This is a marked departure from the initial thoughts that after the faithful blasts in Delhi, people would look at Security as the number 1 concern.

Isnt that a shame? The capital of the country is the showcase to the world. Yet here we are in the capital of 125 crore 4th largest, 1 trillion dollar economy nation that is still battling the essentials of the Maslow's Hierarchy. Its been 60 years and Delhi Jal Board is yet grappling with solutions of providing safe and continuous water to its denizens. Only a few days back, i remember reading that top ranking officials of the DJB being remanded to judicial custody on charges of not being able to do anything about releasing sewage into Yamuna. DJB has not been able to take care of its biggest asset, The Yamuna and on the other hand there is no solution to water shortages. I commend the judiciary for taking a first and firm step in punishing corrupt officials. I only hope such sentences and issues are brought to its logical conslusions in long incarcerations for public officials defiling the power vested into them.

Any city should have 7% of its area under metalled roads. Thats one of the tennets of city planning. The corresponding number for Delhi is 3.5%. There have been flyovers and toll roads and expressways made but the progress has not mainly been in line with the population of vehicles. One interesting case of road planning is Singapore city, which has White, Yellow and Pink number plates for the city vehicles on which taxes are paid. The Pink ones are offlimits inside the city, the yellow ones are allowed to move only in certain times and the white ones have free access. This allows to keep the heavy trucks and slow tempos off the road! In Delhi, you only need to send the weekly Hafta to our friendly neighbourhood traffic constable to do everything and more within or without the law permitting it.

Electricity is a national problem and will continue to be as long electrical subsidies are free for farmers and Transmission losses are not attended to. We dont have policies to deal with electrical theft and otherwise our populist measures suck out electricity in the farmlands more than the requirements.

One question that hit me: If Delhi struggles for these basic amenities 60 years after independence, what might that state of the interiors be?

Again, the need for accountable systems and sharing of information in public through internet and other medium is necessitated. Hope we are able to get into that mode fast for this country'e sake.