Just a vote is not enough

At the outset an apology for writing an anecdote that involves me personally but I include it only to make a larger point Bear with me while I narrate a short story Sometime in 2012 an illegal cigarette shop opened up in the lane where I stay It is a small narrow lane with three buildings and a car mechanicrsquos outlet In only a couple of months the cigarette shop turned into a nightly adda for antisocial elements who would park their vehicles haphazardly thus narrowing the passage further and smoke hundreds of cigarettes well into the nightLeave a mark An elderly citizen displays the ink mark on her finger after voting in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections File picWomen began to feel unsafe there were more than a couple of incidents of lewd comments and the area became a smokerrsquos paradise but a residentrsquos nightmare Unable to bear the smoke families began to close their windows A few asthma patients were hospitalised and senior citizens did not venture out In short it was a scene right out of a Bgrade Hindi movieThe only difference was that there was no hero to save usThe residents of the lane including me petitioned the ward officer No response We petitioned the municipal corporator Jyoti Alavani an independent but affiliated to the BJP No response We petitioned the MLA Congressrsquo Krishna Hegde who stays hardly 500 metres away No response he said he is an MLA and could not do anything in this matter as it was a BMC issue We petitioned the local police station No response We called up the DCP No response Every single one of them said they were helpless Short of taking a morcha to their respective offices the citizens of this narrow lane did everything they could Nothing happened Oh yes the number of antisocial elements increased and the smirk on the stall ownerrsquos face widenedWe finally wrote to the then joint commissioner of police law and order Sadanand Date who ordered the local police station to raid the stall and apprehend the owner and the antisocial elements This happened in 2013 a year later It took us 365 days to get an illegal shop cleared My hunch is that everyone reading this has a similar story to share only the characters may changeThe larger point of narrating this seemingly inconsequential story is this with elections less than 45 days away we are plagued with just one question ldquoWho is responsible for Mumbai for the safety of its residents and for the betterment of the cityrdquoIn a city where the municipal corporator the MLA the police the municipal officer just about everybody is helpless or chooses to remain helpless against a small illegal shop what of the rest of the cityHistorically Mumbai has always been prodded ahead by its private industrious citizens rarely by its bureaucrats and the least by its politiciansIn 2014 therefore our vote becomes even more significant for the Lok Sabha elections The six Members of Parliament for the city need to made accountable and then in October when the state goes to the polls so should the Members of the Legislative AssemblyIn a democracy as this newspaper has argued several times the responsibility of the citizen does not end at just casting onersquos vote Unless residents of this great city participate in the process we will keep voting irresponsible politicians back into power at the local state as well as national levelsIf the first duty of any government is to ensure the safety and security of its citizens the elections are a great time to remind the administration of it It is also a good time to demand answers concrete responses that can be held up to scrutiny and followed up Unless we do that voting in the elections would be a meaningless exercise