by Nava  Thakuria

Thevirtual capital city of northeast India today supports nearly 1.2 milliondwellers along with 6 to 8 lakh floating population and amazingly Guwahati isstill expanding to the north bank of mighty Brahmaputra river. Identified as astrategic city while New Deli is looking forward to south-east Asian nations,Guwahati has now an elected body to look after various needs of the residents.The recent elections of Guwahati Municipal Corporation, held after nine years,pave the way for a new body to take care of the prehistoric city with asustainable growth.

Aspredicted the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party and its ally Asom Gana Parishadsucceeded in winning 58 seats in the 60-member municipal corporation. Twoseats were won by Asom Jatiya Parishad  and Aam Admi Party nominees, butshockingly the main opposition party (Congress) failed to win a single seat. Asthe electronic voting machines were used in GMC polls for the first time tofacilitate 7,97,807 voters (including 4,00,658 females and 26 third-genders), theresults came within hours of the counting of votes. The issues surfaced duringpoll-campaigns include a safe & secured, clean & green, flashflood-free city with the regular supply of piped drinking water to householdsand other civic facilities meant for city-dwellers.

Thenew governing body needs to take some pragmatic steps to resolve various issuesraised by the electorate. Guwahatians deserve a safe city with a smart policeforce working in synchronization with the residents. They should feel the confidenceto go any police station any time with their grievances as well as importantinputs necessitated for the larger interest. Street lights across the city mustwork and the installed CCTV cameras in various points should functionflawlessly. These all arrangements should work as a deterrent to the criminals.Children to senior citizens should be secured while moving around the city.

Publictransport needs to be developed and managed in a dignified way so that everyonecan travel safely. The commuters in the city should get benefits from thepublic transport till midnight, now which turns dead after 9 pm. Thegovernment-run city buses, if not the private ones, should ply on selectedroutes in the evening hours to cater the need of night shift employees inworkplaces. Needless to say that more people use the public transport means theconcerned authority’s relief while managing the traffic on the road and it willfinally help in reducing the degree of air (automobile) pollutionsignificantly.

Thegarbage management system needs more efficient workforces. Open drains in someparts of the city may cause a major health hazard to the citizens. As the cityexperiences heavy rains in monsoon, the drains must have the capacity to takethe sudden water load. Often the drains in city areas start overflowing after adownpour and the filth reaches the streets and even the residential campuses.The water logging problem in many areas of Guwahati should be addressedscientifically.

Asthe city has over 15 small and medium hills with a large number of residentstaking shelter there, necessary policies should be adopted to deal with theissue. The virgin hills, whichever left today, must be protected methodically.Many streams inside the city have almost died because of human aggression and anumber of wetlands are on the verge of extinction. The authority must preservethe water bodies to protect the fragile environment of Guwahati.

The key problem faced bymost Guwahatians for decades remains the scarcity of drinking water. Thousandsof families have to buy water on a regular basis and the situation turns worsein pre-monsoon days. The groundwater depletion because of its excessiveexploitation in the last few years has worsened the situation. In some areasthe groundwater is found contaminated with fluoride and arsenic making thesituation more complicated. If proper initiatives are not taken on time, itwould emerge as a major health hazard to the residents.

Whoever visits thesprawling city from outside expresses surprise why Guwahatians are deprived ofwater even though the mighty Brahmaputra river flows adjacent to it. The Stategovernments in Dispur have taken various mega projects to supply drinking waterto every household in the city, but the ground reality remains the same. Theconsumers are still waiting for the water, supplied regularly to their kitchensby the concerned authority. Judicial use of drinking water should also bepromoted among the city people.

Many Guwahatians use thedrinking water for all purposes from cleaning cars to gardening to washingclothes. The practice only reflects how much precious water the consumersmisuse in their day-to-today life. The concept of rain water harvesting shouldbe promoted so that the residents use the supplied water only for drinkingpurposes. The rest should be managed by the stored rain water to the optimumlevel. Nevertheless the residents deserved to be made collaborators in thegrowth and development of Guwahati.

In recent years, thegovernment has initiated to develop North Guwahati to reduce the populationpressure in the southern bank of Brahmaputra. After the IITG, various otherimportant institutions including AIIMS Guwahati have been established in thenorthern bank.  A new all weather bridge over Brahmaputra connecting thebusiest city points with North Guwahati should ease the movement of commutersas well as the essential items. Finally the government should keep an eye onthe expansion of the northern part of Guwahati so that it would not emerge asanother unplanned city area in near future.

The author is anortheast India-based journalist