Lindsay Pereira: Who needs public amenities?

Most of the space outside Borivli station is taken up by illegal hawkers, who presumably pay some people a lot of money to keep coming back, no matter how many times they are evicted. File pic

There were a number of things the government of Maharashtra could have ruined in 2016, but didn't, possibly because our ministers were busy on study tours or something. As an honest tax-paying citizen, I felt duty-bound to try and think of things they can spend this whole new year ruining, whenever they find the time, after renaming streets and railway stations.

Speaking of railway stations, I think it makes sense for the government to ban pedestrians from using any space outside them. It is pretty much already the norm, given how little space we have outside stations anyway. Most of it is taken up by illegal hawkers who presumably pay some people a lot of money to keep coming back, no matter how many times they are evicted. The evictions happen once a year or so, which is an enormous amount of hard work, but BMC must be excused because they can't be expected to deal with encroachments when there are still roads that require new names.

Playgrounds need to go too. The few that haven't been turned over to politicians for caretaking don't really serve any purpose anyway, considering most children in Bombay are safer playing in their buildings than attempting a game on a rusty slide or hazardous see-saw. Yes, crores are always allocated for the upkeep of these playgrounds, but it's always hard to see this money actually at work, so why keep up the pretence? We should just do away with these playgrounds and allocate the space for far better things, like offices for politicians. After all, our politicians work for us almost every other day and night, and need more than air-conditioned offices at Mantralaya or the odd guest house or two to get some rest in.

Public toilets are another thing that the government needs to focus on. No one's sure why they exist anyway or, more importantly, where they are located, considering they are almost invisible on major highways and barely functional at railways stations and government buildings. Why not break these down and convert them into something genuinely useful, like mini museums dedicated to the lives and times of great BMC corporators? After all, the residents of Bombay deserve to know what their hardworking corporators have been doing all year, putting up hoardings and whatnot. It's a great way to use up space. We can always pee in the open.

BMC schools are another thing that haven't been completely ruined yet, which means there is some work to be done on that front. Eventually, we can shut them all down and privatise education, the way the state has absolved itself and enco­uraged privatised healthcare for years. Why spend money on schools anyway, considering most children at these badly-run institutions will only drop out at class IV and become corporators or politicians? We can use this space for underarm cricket tournaments or something equally edifying.

Heritage buildings need to be reconsidered too. Most of them have been built by the British, which is obviously a slap in the face of nationalists like our politicians. I suggest we tear down heritage buildings and do to them all what we did to the facade of Churchgate station. Yes, it may be ugly and may probably come apart at theseams in a few years, and require a whole new approach, but what better way to utilise public money than to try and try again? Heritage buildings should be painted in bright colours, with large spaces for advertising that can then be utilised by government departments to anno­unce various schemes. They can also be promoted as ‘Selfie Points', so tourists visiting our city may have something to do when they aren't standing outside ATMs trying to procure money for meals.

If there is any money left over from all the things the government finishes ruining in 2017, I suggest the building of more statues at various points across the city. A statue on every beachfront, for instance, or one outside every station, and possibly one at every traffic signal too. We need more statues because they serve as reminders of how many (or few) great leaders we have had in Maharashtra, and the thoughts of these leaders can then occupy our minds while we try and figure out how we can get out of Maharashtra permanently and move to a state that actually does something good for the benefit of its people.

So many good ideas, so little time? No problem. There's always 2018.

When he isn't ranting about all things Mumbai, Lindsay Pereira can be almost sweet. He tweets @lindsaypereira. Send your feedback to mailbag@mid-day.com