Perils of air pollution
The alarming level of pollution in national capital Delhi is a classic example of how the capitalistic growth has landed us in a miserable space. People there are struggling to be able to breathe clean air. They are scared to emerge from their houses owing to rising level of pollution. Schools and colleges are often declared holidays on days when the pollution level crosses beyond tolerable limit. Roads are empty. There are restrictions on vehicular movement. Yet, nothing seems to improve the condition there. Air pollution is a looming threat in other cosmopolitan cities in the country.
The Delhi High Court has ordered the government to restrict movement of ten year old diesel vehicles and fifteen year old petrol vehicles. This order may soon be replicated in other cities such as Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and others. The situation of Delhi has worsened so much that oxygen units have been set up by the roads to supply clean air to people. People who go to work and children who go to school are forced to carry oxygen themselves. Freezing gusty winds coupled with polluted air, have made matters worse.
The reason for this miserable state of Delhi is known to everyone by now. Uncontrolled, unplanned and unbridled growth have left Delhi in shambles. Concrete jungle, blatant violation of safety norms, uncontrolled use of air conditioners and generators have landed Delhi in this wretched state. Though the government has initiated some steps to control pollution in Delhi, it has not been totally successful sine checking industries and burning of waste continues unabated. If things continue this way, our major cities would be reeling under the effects of air pollution. Every week, our major cities register over 4000-5000 new vehicles. We are not equipped with roads for them to ply on. We do not have roads that can accommodate them. The government does not have the political will power to ban new vehicles since the might of corporate companies and their bond with the government will silence every voice of concern.
Hence the whole situation is very dangerous. In Karnataka, Hubballi, Dharwad, Belagavi, Mysore, Hassan, Kalaburgi and other cities face the threat of air pollution leading to many disorders. The civic amenities such as drainage and waste management are not up to the mark. This apart, real estate and land mafia have not left green belt in every layout for breathing green space. Trees are cut during road widening works. Lay outs are coming up on dried lake bunds. Local governance has failed to maintain gardens. People can indiscriminately have borewells. Solar is not installed in most houses. No one is interested in harvesting rain water. Hence situation is going downhill everyday. Other cities will soon walk this path. It has to be our prime concern that we save lakes, wells and rivers along with green cover, forest areas and growing trees for our future generation,.
Government has to make up its mind to ensure air pollution is reduced in the coming days. But environmental concerns are not among the priority of those in power now. They are busy renaming places. The current flawed governance model is responsible for skewed development model followed by corporates. The BJP government is handing over rare forest cover into the hands corporates and is dividing people on faith to win elections. Hence the Yogi government in UP, Haryana and Gujarat ruled by the BJP are busy renaming places. The political parties need to take responsibility and ensure air pollution and other forms are among the manifesto of political parties. Vehicular movement has to be checked and public transport system has to be strengthened. Government has to initiate these significant steps. Of not, we would be forced to buy clean air the way we are buying water through corporate companies. If this has to be avoided, the state government has to get to the act now to check all sorts of pollution.
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Priyanka Gandhi: Cong's talismanic campaigner enters Parliament after 'long, long time'
New Delhi (PTI): Will she? Will she not? And on Saturday, she did. After years of frenzied speculation, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is finally entering the Lok Sabha after a resounding win from Wayanad with many a hope that she will re-energise her party and its dwindling electoral fortunes.
The 52-year-old, who joins her mother Sonia and brother Rahul as an MP in what is a rare instance of three members of a family together in Parliament, would visit Parliament as a teenager to listen to her father Rajiv Gandhi speak as prime minister. Four decades later, she joins as member herself -- her detractors crying nepo politics and her party supporters laying out the proverbial red carpet for a promise finally met.
She should have been a politician to the manner born given the Gandhi legacy. But Priyanka Gandhi took the long and winding way into mainstream politics. First were the questions of whether the mother of two would join active politics, and then whether and when she would contest elections.
In September 1999, she told a journalist her entry into politics may take a "long, long time". And it actually did. She took the plunge 20 years later in 2019 and was later appointed Congress general secretary.
Five years after that, Priyanka Gandhi begins her journey as an elected representative of the people.
With a winning margin of more than 4.1 lakh votes, she has surpassed the tally of her brother Rahul Gandhi from Wayanad in Kerala.
Priyanka Gandhi's entry into Parliament comes at a difficult time for the party, which has been jolted by electoral defeats in Haryana and Maharashtra. It would be interesting to see if she is able give a much-needed fillip to the grand old party and help put it back on electoral track.
Often drawing comparisons with her grandmother Indira Gandhi for their similarity in looks and way of speaking, Priyanka Gandhi has been the go-to campaigner for the party since her entry into active politics and even before that when she campaigned for her mother Sonia and brother Rahul.
And more than both, she is the one who many say has the easiest touch when it comes to communicating with people, individuals and crowds, and also in articulating the party's viewpoint on a range of issues. That she is often seen with her brother, sometimes teasing, sometimes chiding and always affectionate, has added to the image of the convivial politician.
Frequently referring to her childhood, the pain of her father Rajiv Gandhi's assassination and her mother's grief, she steered the Congress' campaign during the general election, adroitly walking the tightrope between striking a familial chord and discussing national-level issues. She proved to be a strategist, orator and mass mobiliser -- all rolled into one.
Most of her speeches are akin to a conversation with the crowd, establishing a connect and giving people the impression that here was a person who was known to them, someone sharing her feelings and thoughts with them.
As star campaigner and strategiser, Priyanka Gandhi helped the Congress make impressive gains in some states as well as in the Lok Sabha polls held earlier in the year. Her campaign helped the Congress get 99 seats in the general election, up from 52 in 2019.
As the curtains came down on the 2024 general election, analysts totted up the numbers to highlight that she has proven to be the party's talisman. Priyanka Gandhi took part in 108 public meetings and roadshows. She campaigned in 16 states and a Union territory, and also addressed two party workers' conferences in Amethi and Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh.
Priyanka Gandhi has often been projected as a possible challenger to Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Varanasi and also as a successor to Congress veteran Sonia Gandhi in the family pocket borough of Rae Bareli.
Soon after the Election Commission announced the Wayanad bypoll, the Congress declared that Priyanka Gandhi would be its candidate from the seat in Kerala. Rahul Gandhi, it decided, would retain the Rae Bareli parliamentary constituency in Uttar Pradesh and vacate the Wayanad seat he won for the second consecutive time.
After her name was announced for the Wayanad bypoll in June, Priyanka Gandhi said, "I am not nervous at all.... I am very happy to be able to represent Wayanad. All I will say is that I will not let them feel his (Rahul Gandhi's) absence. I will work hard and try my best to make everybody happy and be a good representative."
"I have a good relationship with Rae Bareli as I worked there for 20 years and that relationship will never break," she said, adding that both she and her brother will work together in both the constituencies.
Priyanka Gandhi was made Congress general secretary in-charge of the crucial eastern Uttar Pradesh region in January 2019 and then general secretary in-charge of the entire state.
In December 2023, Priyanka Gandhi was made Congress general secretary "without a portfolio". She helped strengthen the organisation and led the party's campaign in Himachal Pradesh, where the grand old party wrested power from the BJP.
Born on January 12, 1972, Priyanka attended New Delhi's Modern School and the Convent of Jesus and Mary. She holds a bachelor's degree in Psychology from Jesus and Mary College, University of Delhi, and also has a master's degree in Buddhist studies.
Priyanka Gandhi is married to businessman Robert Vadra. The couple has two children -- Raihan and Miraya.
Her entry into Parliament has been long awaited by party's workers and supporters and they are hoping she will provide the booster shot the party needs in its difficult phase at the hustings going forward.
