[Reader-list] Of differences between India and China

[zainab at xtdnet.nl]

China does not have the problem of democracy that we have

It was sometime in the month of June. At 10:30 PM, I was waiting at Dadar
for a BEST bus to get home. Quiet, lonely, just a few people around. There
was no bus in sight.

I leaned against the bus stop. On the footpath were several shops, all
shut at this hour. Outside the Bata Shoe Shop, an old man and an old woman
were setting up their bedding. They were pavement dwellers. They sat
chatting once the bedding was up. They were very old and perhaps very,
very poor. About ten minutes later, a man on his bicycle came up on the
footpath. He stopped at the bedroom of the old man and the old woman. On
his bicycle was a steel filter. This man was a traveling tea seller. He
stopped by the old man and old woman and handed them out a cup of tea
each. The couple then brought out a piece of bread each and dunked it in
the tea. Perhaps it was their dinner. The tea seller chatted with them for
a bit with and went away. The couple blessed him as he was leaving.

Last night I was walking from Mazagaon to Byculla to get to home. I passed
by what I thought were the familiar streets of Love Lane, but they did not
seem so familiar yesterday.

As I entered Love Lane from Mazagaon, I found several hawkers who had
spread out clothes and things to sell on plastic sheet. A little ahead was
a man, obviously struck by a schizophrenia seated on his knees, staring at
the ground and oozing out saliva as if there were a fountain stored in
him. A few meters ahead were stray hawkers selling peanuts and bhel puri.
Further down I saw a swank new Sahkari Bhandar store which was never there
earlier. One side of the road in Love Lane is under repair. The laborers
who are here, working on the road repair have set up their tents and there
are preparations being made for dinner. One aspect of poverty lives in my
face. On the other side of the road is a huge garbage dump with an
overflowing municipal rubbish bin.

Further down there is a sense of quiet. Here are the upper middle class
buildings where Bohra, Marwari and Gujarati residents reside. Ahead there
is a gutter burst open and sewage is flowing. The Udupi restaurant is well
lit and abuzz and people are walking in and out of it. A little ahead of
the Udupi restaurant, a man is asleep on the pavement. His beard his thick
and there are tinges of white on it. His face is flush with calm and
restful sleep.

The regular coconut seller is dumping the left over coconuts in a steel
box. This space is now permanently occupied by him ever since I have known
him. The flower seller by the wall of the street has already packed up and
left. The road repairs have intensified further up towards the end of Love
Lane. The sandwich fellow is also packing up his stall. Another
development is the painted picture of the Shirdi Sai Baba which has been
framed on the wall along the street. It has now become a semi-shrine where
people have started throwing coins. A little down a Muslim wedding is
taking place and usual flower seller is making business selling exotic
bouquets. On the opposite side of the road is the Shiv Sena Shakha office.

I have nearly reached the Byculla police station after which I turn into
the lane to go home. The police station is lit up and there is a Hindu
prayer ceremony taking place in the police quarters. A woman is sitting on
the pavement. Asleep a little ahead is her man and at his feet is their
child. At the child’s feet is one shoe which is meant for a child and a
lady’s shoe. I don’t know if this is an irony of some sort.

This evening, a dear friend of mine tells me of Nandan Nilekani’s
interview he recently watched on television. Thom Friedman, the
interviewer, asked Nilekani what is the difference between India and
China. Nilekani replied saying that China does not have the problem of
democracy which India has.

My word!



Zainab Bawa
Bombay
www.xanga.com/CityBytes
http://crimsonfeet.recut.org/rubrique53.html