Metro Trouble

I believe that a Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS) like the Delhi Metro is not a feasible, long-term intra-city transport option.

Here’s why.

As an entirely electricity dependent MRTS, the Delhi Metro naturally consumes a considerable amount of electricity. Nonetheless, there seems to be no general consensus regarding its exact consumption- a paper on the Institution of Railway Electrical Engineers website claims it’s the largest power consumer in Delhi, a May 9, 2006 report on the Tribune website puts the same to 45MW, or 1.15%, of the average demand of 3,200MW and a write-up on the Metro’s website fixes total consumption to 75+45=120MW or 3.75% of the average demand of 3,200MW. Now, as anybody who’s spent this summer in Delhi knows, this last figure cannot possibly be accurate, for, first, as the channels and papers have been publicising, the total demand at the peak of summer in June was a staggering 1000MW more at around 4,400MW and second, since this figure is so patently obsolete and the Metro’s network has increased considerably since then, its net consumption of too must’ve gone up. There is, unfortunately, no clear figure for that.

Be that as it may, one thing is totally unambiguous: an over-whelming percentage of the Metro’s electricity comes from either non-renewable fossil fuels like coal and natural gas or from ecologically unsound hydroelectric power plants in the lower and middle Himalayas. This crucial fact has till now been consistently ignored by media and civil society alike, for even as we rightfully applaud the DMRC for installing a solar power plant on the Connaught Place station and justifiably take pride in it been awarded carbon credit validation by the German TUVNORD for the use of the innovative regenerative breaking technology, we simultaneously forget that at its core the Metro still functions on hazardous, toxic and ecologically unsafe technologies. Like a majority of successful corporate establishments, all the DMRC does is to stay on the right side of public conscience by adopting small, piece-meal green methods with great fanfare without changing it’s core base of unsound energy generation technologies.

What is urgently required, therefore, is a holistic scientific analysis by an independent, unbiased agency on the overall environmental impact of the Metro’s creation and its unfettered expansion.

First of all, it must be found out to what extent electricity generation in thermal power plants offsets the Metro’s commendable achievement of preventing emission of around 2,275 tonnes of vehicular carbon-dioxide. Indeed, even as we in Delhi celebrate the supposedly modernising influence of the Metro and felicitate it for it’s role in the reduction of vehicular pollution, we overlook the fact that the DMRC characteristically follows conventional Western wisdom of ‘out of sight, out of mind’ by increasingly buying power from a NPTC plant in far-off Orissa. All this happening in the National Capital acquires another, ironical dimension when we consider how the Indian Government cries itself hoarse in every international climate change forum about developed Western nations relocating all their dirty work to developing countries and so making them victims to their insatiable hunger for resources.

Similarly, a detailed study on the multi-nuanced ecological impact of the construction of the Metro too is in order. The DMRC claims to be “one of the most eco-friendly projects in Delhi” so it will be worthwhile to find out whether or not it sources construction material like bricks, cement, concrete, girders etc from clean, green and ethical firms instead of the popular run of the mill profit-maximising, unsound businesses. The affects of exposure-whether adverse or not and if so, how much-to fine concrete dust to construction workers and those living near construction sites too must be conclusively established.

Moving on, one must also consider the costs involved in maintaining the DMRC’s entire network. Whether or not the Metro makes profits, maintenance costs are bound to go up each year as its assets age. Gradually, in about a decade or so, it’ll be bound to phase out a majority of its existing rolling stock if it still wants to maintain its current high standards and afterwards major changes and upkeep would be required in all the stations as well. It is not wholly inconceivable that as time passes maintenance costs would slowly become a considerable amount of its expenditure so that the DMRC’s huge infrastructure and unmovable assets might just end up as an encumbering public liability. Once again, an unprejudiced investigation is in order to determine whether or not these will eventually become equal to or override the net income.

On the whole, I think the DMRC can really not be fully blamed for not being far-sighted enough to anticipate these issues: it is, after all, just a modern replica of a century old transport model carried out under the guidance of a smart and efficient yet aging man. What is surprising, however, is that nobody in Delhi seems to have realised that the Metro, in its current avatar, is only repeating old mistakes and so seems to be going well down the way of becoming an embarrassing liability for the city. Indeed, had even a fraction of the will and money spent in erecting the humongous Metro network been spent on refurbishing roads and revamping the bus system the need for the Metro would never have arisen and the transport problem solved without so much exertion. The very induction of air-conditioned buses in the DTC’s fleet, which will make available to the common citizen a facility till now the Metro’s complete monopoly, coupled with the increase in road space and, so, vehicular traffic raises serious question marks over the very existence of the project as some of its basic objectives get gradually defeated.

All of this is not to say that I am against the Metro. No, like all Delhities, I too have more or less enjoyed the Metro experience and do sincerely believe that by setting enviable professional standards it has brought about a sea change in and contributed immensely to the evolution of public attitudes and consciousness, creating, in fact, a whole new ‘Metro culture’ of discipline, responsibility and patience. Nevertheless the Metro is no holy cow and, more now than ever before, we need to evaluate the whole project in a radical, all-encompassing manner and ascertain its viability for the moderately long-term. That alone will be beneficial for the city.

A Planet For Sale

For the last two and a half centuries or so, a great movement has been going on. Initiated in England, it soon spread all over Europe and then, leaping across the seven seas, it gradually engulfed all lands of this fair Earth. Never ceasing, never stopping, it continuously marches forward, forever striving fro perfection, forever forging new roads in pristine wilderness. The emissaries of this movement, this ‘Grand Design’ as it were, are perpetually engaged in the onerous task of the expansion of its domains and the widening of the spheres of its dramatic and drastic influence…

This movement is of rape. Of Plunder. Of Destruction.

This movement is of industrialisation, a movement which has lent to this human race unnatural and unprecedented power over the natural elements, making him/her the arbitrator of the fate of all the myriad species on Earth…

The forward march of machines into our world has not only irreparably scarred the beauty of the natural world, it has also choked and throttled the bond that holds all men/women to that greatest manufacturer of all- Nature…

In his/her haste to produce more, infinitely more, the Western man/woman of the nineteenth century went around heedlessly extracting resources and mindlessly polluting the elements. But yet, he/she may be pardoned, for it is very probable that neither did he/she understand the true import of his/her actions nor were there any who could have successfully pointed out to him/her the folly of his/her apocalyptic ways.

No, it is the modern industrialist whom one must condemn for consciously not listening to this last desperate call of Nature- what else except base action for petty self interest can such a deliberate turning away from the correct path in full knowledge of the disastrous consequences of doing so be regarded? Reports flowing inform all over the world betray the same sense of desperate anxiety. Hitherto unexpected rises in global temperatures have led to huge scale melting of glacial ice all over the world. Acute water shortage, disease, starvation, war, death- all of these confront humanity with a single minded determination never before witnessed in the entire history of this marvellous race.

And how do our governments react to this? Putting up sad faces and helplessly wringing their hands, they contemplatively shake their heads- in short, they put up as good a farcical disguise as possible and whole heartedly and stupidly commit the same mistakes again…

In a day and age wherein ‘development’ and ‘growth’ are the mantra of life, government policies are getting more and more influenced by considerations of the head than of the heart. Economic jargons like GDP, FDI, per capita income etc. dictate national policy, while issues infinitely more pressing are pushed to the sidelines. Witness this in the positions of the governments of India and china, the fastest growing polluters on this planet, on cutting down carbon emissions-while blaming on one hand (rightly and justifiably) the West for much that is wrong with the environment today and asking it to mend its ways, they seek on the other for themselves an amnesty from compulsory reduction of carbon based pollutants, the only reason being the ‘great losses’ which their so called ‘stupendously growing’ economies would incur if such a measure were to be forced onto them.

What could be more suicidal?

This just like saying that we can’t do the right thing because it’s difficult. Remember the story of the man who cut off the branch on which he was sitting? Can you see the analogy, the terrible similarity no? For though it is true that the West is responsible for almost all of the mess that the world is in today, it is also undeniable that the West will be the least affected by this mess simply because it has the resources to bait itself out of it. Not just that, the West, atleast the E.U., which, from THE polluter has become THE champion of the cause, has also humbly acknowledged its mistakes and is trying its best to work out a solution. Nature gave Europe that rarest of the rare- a second chance, a chance to once again stand up on its feet…

On the other hand, grossly over populated countries like China and India really cannot afford to cut off their branches simply because they will not get a chance to redeem their mistakes afterwards. Therefore, while it is true that ‘developing’ nations, like ours, will suffer the most from the inevitable catastrophe to come, a disaster which is not of their own making, it is also undeniable that these very ‘economies’, if they continue going upon their current, unsustainable way, will catalyse the already picking up steam process of decay and degeneration. This is one case where pointing fingers will prove to be totally futile, where passing the buck will most certainly prove to be fatal…

Industrialisation is in itself an irreversible process and to attempt to undo it will only betray extreme lack of comprehension. All that is needed is the humanisation of industrialisation: to see the world of men and women not as a separate but an integral part of the natural world and to work diligently towards not the deadening but the toning down of the feverish pace of this (presently) self-destructive progress and putting in its place a system of compassion, understanding and foresight, a system wherein are put to use the qualities of not just the head but also the heart…

There is before this generation, the generation of you and me and countless others, a great big challenge, a challenge that will require the shouldering of a responsibility that will in turn require courage, intelligence and, most importantly, the will to unhesitatingly and readily act…

The Merchants are everywhere- ready to sell bodies, lives, souls. They are ready to barter all that is good and real in this world for all that is bad and illusionary.

We must not let that happen. We must not let this Planet be put up for Sale…


Venus, the Earth’s neighbouring planet on the ‘sunny side’ is, quite literally, a gas chamber. That is to say that its atmosphere has a tremendously high percentage of carbon dioxide which, by trapping all the heat radiated back from its surface to space, makes it an inferno of scorching heat and blinding dust. Life in the organic form, which needs more of oxygen and (dramatically) less of carbon dioxide, can naturally not flourish there…

Scientists and astronomers recently came up with a startling revelation- Venus at one time did have surface and sub surface water. Perhaps life in the ‘organic form’ did exist there…

Supposing that it did, the big question becomes not how but why and what. Why did it come to an end? What cataclysm erased all traces and forms of life from the Evening Star?

There are no easy answers.

That’s exactly what some other form of life will wonder when it looks at the earth say a millennium later.

Unless, of course, that we do something about it, the greatest problem of our times, right now.