Missing Link

Paleontologist say crocodiles that we see today behaved and looked same as they did 6.5 crore years ago during the Jurassic period when dinosaurs roamed i.e. they have not evolved much.

This small stretch of the Pashan-Baner Link road ahead of Athashree and past MontVert Fineese looked same as in mid 2005.

Roads on either side of this patch are in fine condition. Road behind this patch upto Sus road is good and the road ahead of this patch until Baner road too is superb.

This patch doesn't appear too bad from this angle but for the commuters who have to cross it daily.

I still remember an all-appartment meeting held right in front of Athashree gate sometime in Oct-2005. People from the only appartments in existence then, viz. OJAS, Kubera-Bahar, Athashree, MontVert Fineese and Whispering Wind had gathered and small speeches were made where people typically narrated details of the trouble and inconvenience caused due to the bad state of the Pashan-Baner Link road. None had any directions or thoughts on how to tackle this situation or improve the condition of the road. An enthusiastic attendee also declared formation of a forum which he fondly named the 'mohalla comittee' which was never to meet again.

I remember only Pandit Mali and Deepak Jawarkar from Whispering Wind attending this meeting since many in WW have not yet moved in while D-bldg was still under construction.

In early 2007, walking on the the P-B link road was a nightmare, especially where it touched the Sus road, as is evident from the photo below. The only respite was this narrow footpath which again was broken intermittently as in this case for entrance to Orange County, for example.


Looking in the other direction, the glorious 4x4 lane Sus road had not come up yet. It is still early 2007 and CYG games were still 18 months away. Nor did the circle in the Balaji Mandir Chowk exist then.






(Click photos to enlarge)

The empty land on the left side of the footpath was occupied by hutments and people living there frequently crossed the P-B link road to fetch water on the right side where the green plastic pots are seen.

Ok so the mohalla committe meeting was held at the spot right where this truck has got stuckup. This is in front of Athashree gate and tells more about the sorry state of the road.

The condition of the road was absolutely pathetic and the small patch of road in the first photo in this blogpost is a remnant from those days.

Saplings

Little knowledge is available with me on how exactly we take from mother earth and how to give back.
But looking at the various construction sites around Whispering Wind, it only appears that we are neither taking nor giving but virtually dumping mother earth.

It all begins when digging starts at a construction site and then with or without consent of the adjacent open plot owner, they start laying the rada-roda on the open plot as in the example of this plot besides Whispering Wind Phase II. The building under construction in the background is Crystal Garden.

The rada-roda could be from various sites like Crystal Garden, WW II or this unknown site opposite Crystal Garden. The buildings in the background are all MontVert Finesse.

The photo above is dated mid-summer (8-April-09) and its a pity that the water table below this plot will be a lost gift from mother earth.

The most unfortunate thing about these diggings is that green fields flourishing on top of rich black alluvial soil are lost forever.

The plot of WW Phase II looks barren when construuction had just begun im March 2009.

But underneath the cross section reveals the almost 3 ft thick layer of black soil.

And a testimony to this fact that were rich farming lands is the photo below dated Aug-2005 taken from Whispering Wind B-bldg and shows the site of WW Phase II.

The plot looks barren because rada-roda from WW was perhaps dumped on top of the green fields.

The dense trees lined up along the right edge are no longer seen now.Elsewhere, the cross-section on Pashan-Baner Link road near Symantec's parking entrance shows various layers of black soil and rada-roda.

Closer to WW, the cross-section of Valenncia besides WW also reveals about a foot thick layer of black soil.

Another latest instance is the plot for Padma-Vilas opposite OJAS and besides Kubera Bahar as below:

No one can now imagine or bothers to ponder over who lived in the fields, what they did, etc.

Q: So why is an earthworm called the friend of a farmer ?

A: Because the farmer works alone in the fields all day and the worm gossips with him, thats why...

Good joke, but they have both gone. I can't bring the farmers back but certainly could pull a few worms off the Mula river bed near under rajaram bridge in June 2008.

They are happily living in the 3'x3' pit that I made for them exclusively and fed with all the bio-waste generated in my home.

They have now grown into a joint-family of few hundred worms and creating rich manure.

A testimony to this was a sapling which grew out of the mango seeds that I also dumped as part of the bio-waste last year into their home.

I planted the 2-leaf mango sapling behind the Ganesh temple in Whispering Wind in July 2008 and by May 2009 it had steadly developed almost a dozen leaves and grew over a feet tall.

In June 2009 I discovered that all but the stem remained. The utterly lax security of Whispering Wind promptly informed that this must be mischief of some naughty stranger or passerby.

Loss of a sapling is only the tip of iceberg with many more thefts reported in the past one year.

This year again 3 new mango saplings have grown - a gift from my worms.

I will plant these again - one in the same place and the rest elsewhere, probably outside the premises of Whispering Wind where they are not at the mercy of naughty passer byes or the ridiculous security.

In essence, here is what we have done to mother earth:

(a) Destroyed a natural eco-system that was self-sustaining and self-governing.

(b) Built a man-made system i.e. buildings and more buildings, which niether are able to sustain itself not govern or manage itself like security, builders, housekeeping, etc.

The gist of the story - Its time to start giving back to mother earth is now !!!