Tadoba, Rains & School Named Forest!

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“In the forest on every turn ahead there awaits a story for you”… Me.

These are the words which I feel (read as, I live) every time I visits the forests & when the place is Tadoba that too in the rains then it’s like entering in the room of stories! Right from the guides to trees to gypsy drivers to forest labors to over flowing streams, every person & every place has some story to offer & rains if makes the usual sighting scene a bit dull (sighting of the tiger) then it opens up many other doors to the story rooms which we forget to visit in the zest of visiting the one with tigers, in short, it’s the rains which makes you able to see the forest from a different perspective.

In the rains, tadoba land is full of greens with floor of the forest displaying Junglee Tulas's (a wild shrub) carpet & as the gypsy wheels comes in contact with its leaf the entire surrounding gets filled with a fresh fragrance which can only be experienced & not told in the words! This, I got enlightened by the guide as suddenly the forest used to be filled with this heavenly fragrance & I asked to the guide from where this fragrance is from, on this, he answered, sir, ye junglee tulas ke paudhe hai, inko maslao to hi ye sugnadh dete hai, aur jipsy ke tyre ke niche aate hai to jungle mahakane lagata hai! On top of it, the clouded sky with sun breaking free from time to time makes entire forest playing light & shadow game & when on a turn you saw the Ghost walking towards you on a misty road, you feel is this a dream or reality! Yes, on one such rain morning, when we were wondering what we will be seeing as earlier day it has rained through all the evening & night & sky has just opened up, and suddenly from long a mall object was walking towards us & to my (to all those in gypsy) surprise, it was a male leopard. Again, this is bucket wish list ticked for me as a leopard walking head-on from the canopy of trees around, is something I have dreamed of for years & in monsoon safari when I expected of least of any sighting my, this dream has fulfilled! And what more but the leopard was with us for nearly one hour on different roads, reasons, we were silent totally, there were no other gypsies & the forest was free of tiger in that particular area, so the leopard can move fearlessly! As well though leopards don’t have fixed territory like the tigers yet they do mark their territories whichever they will be occupying & this guy was on such move, that’s why he was traversing all the forest so openly. As well his inward curbing stomach was indication that the leopard was hungry & along with marking territory, he was parallelly looking for food also & all these along with lesser vehicles in the park made me able to tick one of the longest pending wishes in my bucket list & this was possible may be due to I dared to visit tadoba in the rains also!  The only problem was my both cameras got malfunctioned & I was cursing myself for not being able to get a single good shot (few I did get) but then I realize sometimes having camera is a curse as when you don’t get to see anything you get frustrated & when you get to see something & you couldn’t click it properly then also you get frustrated, as forest is to enjoy the moments & being able to click is a bonus, I reminded this to myself once again & forgot about good images of the leopard!

Another incidence (rains special) occurred on the next day when during one of our rounds on the main Chandrapur Moharli road (this road is open to all the people as it connects two towns though stopping on this road is not allowed as its part of the safari of buffer zone too!) when we get to know from a passerby that he saw a tiger entering in forest from the main road just some thirty minutes back & our Sherlock Holmes job started to trace that tiger. As there is one female tigress names Choti Madhu, which has very small cubs & they are known to be kept by her on the opposite side of the road where she has crossed in the forest (as per our informant), we started following her tracks thinking she also must be on kill & after taking rounds will surely return to her cubs as they are just a month old. We crisscrossed entire that part of the forest but no-where we get her pugmarks though the tracks were wet & then we decided to wait on a road where she was supposedly to return towards her cubs. After ten minutes of wait suddenly alarm calls of the spotted deer rang all around us indicating tigress was nearby & on move & our guess was right, we waited to locate the movement of the calls. On right side of us there was another parallel road & on left side of us was main road beyond which the cubs have been kept. And suddenly from right side some hen started shouting listening to deer alarm calls, they were local shepherds (sheep care takers) & as this forest is part of buffers they were allowed. We thought the tigress won’t go to that side as human movement is there as well the road was too much muddy & ours was only gypsy so the driver wasn’t ready to risk to drive further ahead thinking if the wheels get stuck in the mud, then it will be problem, so we hurried to main road & waited for nearly three hours hoping tigress will return to her cubs & has to come on main road to cross it but nothing happened! After that one gypsy came from park gate & we told them to go inside & check for the pugmarks of the tigress & as they entered from where we have come out of the forest & didn’t came out in fifteen minutes, we understood the only reason they can remain inside means they have seen the tigress & we also followed that gypsy & there she was sitting silently in a pond, hardly some fifty feet ahead from where we have returned three hours earlier! And those shepherds were still there unaware of her presence though she was very much aware of them & was just waiting for them to go away. Had we gone hardly a turn ahead while we listened the alarm calls, we could have seen her in open but we though she will be disturbed by the shepherds which she did yet patiently she waited there only. The tigress has made a kill right when we heard the alarm calls & has hidden it near by & was waiting those shepherds to move away & then to have her meal at peace; this is tiger in its best survival mode, display of which we have just witnessed!

That night it rained so much that next day morning even to reach to the park gate was not possible as many of the roads were flooded & wasn’t possible to drove the car through that flooding water so we waited at resort only! That evening I decided to take a walk around the resort on main road & in pitch black darkness around I could hear music of thousands of frogs singing together from the fields along the road & trust me at night few sounds are really scary, especially when you know its forest & anything can happen, though it was a main road on which I was walking but such experiences are wroth going through, with proper care & knowledge only! Many people wonder why I go forests so often, time & again I have answered this in many ways but when its rains even the so-called wildlife enthusiasts also wonder, why to take so much pan & labour to visit forests in these times when chances of seeing a tiger are less & I don’t blame them as my answer is, then they haven’t understood what a forest is, in the first place!  In the rains I agree, chances of seeing a tiger are less but then you never know what you will be lucky with on for e.g., the sighting of leopard in the most relaxed way. The feel of the green forest, knowledge about things like Junglee Tulas fragrance & many such are the addons’! And one more thing, may it be harsh summer, chilling winters or drenching rains, life in the forests never stops for anything & its like an open school where you learn by mere observing all these species how they adopt with every season without any technology at their service & learn to coexist with nature, that’s the biggest gain I get by visiting forests often!

Last but very important for me (though repeated hundredth times), if we can keep buffers open in rains then why not core area too & why not all parts of the forests, as not only it gives means to livelihood to thousands of humans residing around the forests which directly helps wildlife but it will make wildlife open to all those urban people who are unaware of these treasures of nature & their responsibility to protect it! And combinedly all these i.e., tourists, gypsy drivers, guides are like eyes, ear & nose of the forests keeping all the ill elements who are enemies of wildlife on their toes, so open up all the forests on all 365 days & for that give proper infrastructure support to the forest dept!

Before I conclude, just when I was writing last para of this sharing, I came across a disturbing video of a leopard & news also, which wandered in a village in dazed condition. It was so disheartening to see the poor animal moving like zombie but fortunately someone informed forest dept & now the leopard is in habitation centre in Bhopal. The dazed leopard wandering in village like a domestic animal is a classic example of man-animal conflicts because all around us forest cover is reducing as well people around the forests are needed to make themselves aware about this conflict & wildlife tourism is the only & best effective tool to make humans learn coexistence, all those who are patient enough to read till now, please share as somewhere someone will act, adios with this note!

You can check some tadoba rain moments at link below...

https://www.flickr.com/photos/65629150@N06/albums/72177720310689088

#savemyhome movement

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Sanjay Deshpande 

Sanjeevani Dev.

Please view my sharing about real estate in Pune at You Tube link below..

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4xX7eopH5o&t=5s

 

Please do visit my blog links below to read about real estate & home buying! 

https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2023/01/defining-good-home-real-estate-in-2023.html

http://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2023/02/blog-post.html

Creating Togetherness; team Sanjeevani Way (Click link below) 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/65629150@N06/albums/72157627904681345

For any of your complaints about city, log in at link below

www.punecorporation.org

Take your issues to Hon PM at link below..

https://secure.mygov.in/

Think Green, Think Life

www.sanjeevanideve.com / https://junglebelles.in/

Dreaming Big, Being Big & Remaining Big, Real Estate Way!

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“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure” … Colin Powell

Colin Luther Powell was an American politician, statesman, diplomat, and United States Army officer who was the 65th United States secretary of state from 2001 to 2005. He was the first African American secretary of state. And the reason for remembering these words of Mr. Powel is, an interesting question or say query from a friend (who himself works with revenue services, which supposedly gives you maximum exposure to business/trades of the society) & he asked me what is the reason or say success mantra of big companies like DLF or Soba (big companies in real estate) in real estate, how they grow so big & why many of other fails miserably! I first thought he is pulling my leg as he himself is at such a position where he must be coming across many top-level businessmen & seen their organizations closely & then who I am to comment on companies’ success or failures which are thousand times bigger than my own setup on every front! But the question remained in my mind, so I messaged him back that I will try to write as I spoke with myself (I do that often, though it’s one sign of madness), why not as I remembered a story in Zen (where else) regarding this aspect of understanding! The story was about a young Chinese scholar who has read many books on religion & philosophy & he came across a book on religion of which few chapters he was unable to understand so he started asking people around who can help him in understanding those chapters. But nobody in his village was able to make him explain the meaning of those chapters, so he decided to venture to other cities & started for a journey. In one town he came to know about an old wise woman who can help him, which is what people told him, so he went to meet the old lady. After meeting her the young scholar greeted her & asked whether she can help him to understand the chapters of the book he has. On this, the lady said she will be happy to help but the only problem is, she can’t read as she hasn’t learnt to read, so, if the young man reads her out those pages, then she will try to explain! Hearing this, the scholar was shocked & he asked back, old lady, if you even don’t know reading then how can you explain its meaning to me! The lady smiled & pointed her finger to the moon in the sky & asked the boy to look at the moon. The boy looked in the direction of the finger & then the lady asked him, is my finger a moon, the boy replied, no, it isn’t! The lady asked, does I move the moon to its location, the boy replied, no, you didn’t! On this, the lady said, yet I could guide you with my finger to you to sight the moon, right! Hearing this the boy got enlightened & he bowed in front of the old lady & said, I understood the meaning of the chapter, thank you very much & left!

Well, I am not playing the old lady here nor I am some Zen master yet I used the story for the readers who will continue to read ahead, that what I will be sharing is just what I have understood about the real estate or say business a little bit & that’s what I will share with my friend as my answer to his query & to justify my daring, I used this Zen story, lol! Ok, coming back to the question which actually is like opening a box of pandora (especially in real estate) as I have been associated with business for more than three decades & has seen many companies around me to rise at mega level & then managed to vanish in the thin air & then there are companies which are going great even today, while few were small units & now are aspiring to make it big. Speaking about myself, I never even dreamed that I would be running my own business & now it's nearly two decades since I am running a real estate business of my own! I haven’t made it big or great by myself but I am happy for what I could do, let me confess this at the start & I have survived, is also a fact, an important one! While DLF was in deep trouble a few years back, may be still in but Soba is surely doing great across our country as well in the Middle East also, to my knowledge! These two names I took, as my friend has mentioned them, nothing in person I have anything with them! By me, a real estate company becomes big can be a fluke or stroke of luck also, if you are counting bigness (read as success) on the scale of money earned or profits, because when your raw material is land & country’s population is ever increasing then you need not have to be a fortune-teller to tell that anybody who has land holding is going to be rich! Though this is half-truth as even if you are owning thousands of acres in the desert, still you will end up as  poor only (unless that desert has oil fields underneath), so one must be smart enough which land to be bought & when! Because in our country every land use is governed by the govt & it’s not the land but the development around your land defines the fate of your land! And even a gambler needs to be wise (rather more than in any other trade) as he must know when to stop, is what decides the fate of the gambler! Again, with due respect to all big & successful firms in real estate, the similarity between gambling & real estate ends here i.e., the raw material land & luck, so from here the journey towards becoming big starts & to retain that bigness is a success!

First & foremost, whatever the product may be, the major character which makes any company big or say trustworthy in the eyes of its clients is, consistent delivery of what you have promised! And here a client doesn’t mean only those who books a flat or shop or office with you but every that person to whom you commit something, may it be a payment against some service or returning a call or acknowledging a mistake in time, everything matters, as you become big only by making people around grow along; this, most of the firms in real estate forgets & that’s the reason of not having many numbers in big league & for long! As well, this simple Mantra may look easy on the face but it’s extremely difficult to achieve when you are making it big because to grow big you need to build a team, a team which believes in what’s your idea is, of right & wrong as then only that team will deliver what you are committing!  This I have observed with many firms as they were really good in delivering their promises when they were small or medium in volume (read as turnover) but once they grew big, they failed because the team which also got bigger in the numbers was not in tune with what owners were & then failures towards promises happened in multiplying terms, resulting failure! Here again, we are not much fond of setting up systems leave apart following them (accept it, dear countrymen) & if you want to grow big, more than that want to sustain that bigness, then there must be an ever-evolving system in place which has to be followed by majority of the team, which is a hard job & needs a focused approach which many developers either lack or doesn’t think it’s important! And the companies which have become big on turnover scale, every one of them has a proper system for every front of the work & a system to monitor the system is also is in place! Do mind, no system works by its own, a very senior IAS officer has once told this to me, British ruled us from thousands of miles for two centuries & without any modern electronic communication system support available then, but a reporting system & a documentation system (7/12 types) & bureaucratic system to monitor the work-system, is what made this possible!

On top of it, the systems must be flexible on surface as real estate is a very local business where policies as well people, everything is different on city-to-city basis also & a company which wants to grow big must be open to changes, one more characteristic for which our businessmen (read as builders) are not famous for! As every city’s needs are different from the homoes & so are the people we need to handle & all these differences must be accommodated by your team as well by the system. Only the companies which are flexible enough to make such changes without touching the core of the systems have made it big! A big company focuses more on systems as well as team building than just setting their eyes on the profit margins & one more thing, which again is a weak link of real estate & that is data! Of-late many companies in real estate have been doomed only because of over-trading (we all know this) & what is overtrading but lack of data, right? As, if you know how much demand is at which place & keeps building that much only then you will never venture in over-trade, is simple logic which most failed to understand & adopt! Along with over-trading, one more thing the companies which has grown big in real estate have followed & that is, sticking only to doing what they are good at & not try to venture in other businesses just they become successful in real estate! This doesn’t mean I am against expansion or diversification, but what it means is, every business or trade needs different skills though the basics may be the same & I have seen many big real estate firms losing their fortune made from real estate in venturing into different trades IT or Hotels & other such!

Finally, the businessman himself /herself must have a fire within to become big as then only all above qualities or habits or characteristics are of any use (for e.g. I don’t have it in me, let me confess this very frankly)! Do mind, every successful company which grows big & carries that bigdom has followed mostly the same path whatever trade it may be in but failure comes in many ways, is what in nutshell I have understood; with this note, I conclude my humble sharing about becoming big & staying big!

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Sanjay Deshpande 

Sanjeevani Dev.

Please view my sharing about real estate in Pune at You Tube link below..

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4xX7eopH5o&t=5s

 

Please do visit my blog links below to read about real estate & home buying! 

https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2023/01/defining-good-home-real-estate-in-2023.html

http://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2023/02/blog-post.html

Creating Togetherness; team Sanjeevani Way (Click link below) 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/65629150@N06/albums/72157627904681345

For any of your complaints about city, log in at link below

www.punecorporation.org

Take your issues to Hon PM at link below..

https://secure.mygov.in/

Think Green, Think Life

www.sanjeevanideve.com / https://junglebelles.in/

Don the Dog, Unknown Boy, a Tiger & Society!

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“Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on’… Robert Kennedy.

Robert Francis Kennedy, also known by his initials RFK and by the nickname Bobby, was an American politician and lawyer. Irony is like his famous brother John F Kennedy who was President of USA, Robert also was assassinated & that’s why his above words about crime & society, I felt using, to start my sharing! Well, the heading may have city in it but the sharing is not about expectations from the Mai-Baap govt to improve roads or traffic (well, a bit is there) but it’s about people & society at large (read as citizens of Aapale Pune) as the subject is very close to each of us here not just Pune city but Pune region at large! As usual, two news stories (rather three, third I will speak about last) were there which caught my attention & frankly I am not a person who gets shaken easily (that’s why I can be a builder, which is my earning profession) yet they did shake me up from within! One was about a stray dog which comes under the wheels of a Lamborghini (a racer car which costs Rs 3 cr plus) & other was a boy of age 7 years, who also came under the wheels of a desi car & died! You will say the boy’s news if ok but what's the big deal in some stray-dog dying under a car on road, that’s what their fate is or else how the infamous phrase in Hindi would have been there i.e., “kutte ki maut marana”! Well, it seems the Lamborghini owner also must have thought the same but unfortunately this Kutta though was unlucky to get killed under the car yet was lucky to have people who stood for his death & a commotion started over its death. Unfortunately for the car owner the whole incidence was recorded in a CC Tv in the respective Chowk (That’s real lucky for the dog) & it shows not only the car driver was aware of dog coming under car’s wheels but he sped up even after then & dragged the poor dog for some distance, & fled from the spot, not bothering to check what has happened to the poor dog! 

 

This Video of CC Tv footage of dog getting under car tyres, I have watched & it’s sickening (any death is sickening), but attitude of the drive makes it more sickening & this is reason of my, this sharing i.e., this attitude which cares a hang about other’s lives! Irony is, the said car owner is supposed to be a big shot jeweller in Pune (Nagarakar Saraf) & in that very Chowk where his posh car killed the dog, their firm’s big hoarding stands, proudly displaying designs of jewelleries & with a message about values of family & life! And then in the second incidence on very same day which happened in Pimpri Chinchwad, a man, farmer by profession dashed a two-wheeler which was being driven by a woman with her son of 7 years behind & the son got under the wheels of farmer’s car & yet the man kept driving dragging the boy under its wheel for some 200 meters, & the boy died! What an horrific experience for the mother to witness her son getting dragged under the car in-front of her own eyes & she was helpless! Here again the car driver neither took any notice when he must have known that he had collided with the two-wheeler & should have stopped immediately, that could have saved the boy’s life just the way the Lamborghini driver should have stopped when his car hit the dog but he also didn’t!

It’s this attitude is my sharing’s subject as it indicates two things: one is, how selfish, arrogant, and careless the society has become towards other’s life & second is, how weak, ineffective, our law enforcement system has become which includes our judicial system also! As in both the cases of accidents (actually, I can’t call it accident but law says so) the men involved were fit, healthy & in good mental state (rather one of them, the jeweller is supposedly an Influencer on social media, keeps posting videos of his fitness regime often) & they did this in broad day light on busy roads. Their vehicles also were in perfect shape, meaning no malfunctioning of brakes or failure of any spare-part of the car can be the cause & they were in full senses when they hit the respective victims of the accident & yet neither of them once thought of stopping & helping the deceased! The dog case guy was even adamant enough first to decline the fact that he was driving the car but the CC Tv footage clearly reveals that’s him so later admitted! & then there is only one Lamborghini in this part of city was another unfortunate thing or else he would have said it’s not his car in itself!  Both these men are family men, educated & yet they can be so senseless or shameless to act in such fashion after accident, is something beyond my imagination & that’s more sickening for the society at large as somewhere we are at fault as a parent, as teacher, as a friend, as a boss, as a coworker to help each other & respect life! Where are the values, care, humanity, apathy, goodness, kindness, help & all such words & why can’t we make them understand to each other, is my reason for sharing this topic! Here, I remember a test in one of my aptitude tests long back when the students used to ask when you see a man falling on road by slipping over a banana leaf, what will be your reaction? Most students used to answer, we would rush to help the man while the right answer (as per the examiners) was, your first reaction will be you will laugh at the sight! Well, the answer may be right but by me it was very wrong as it teaches you to be insensitive towards others pain while what we should teach is, to make the students think in the direction of helping others when they need it than responding to basic nature, that is missing from the society right from our homes to schools to work places! If you don't believe me, then in the recent fatal accident on Samrddhi HighWay where a bus caught fire then the passer by didn’t stop to help but went of as most of the people prefers to keep away from helping to any person involved in the tragedy & reasons are many, not just selfishness! This is what we must share wherever possible as we can’t have a police cop behind every vehicle to control the accidents; it's a fact, it’s the people who should care for each other’s lives, right?

And then it's not about just caring about other people's life but what I see around me is, most people are not caring for their own life also in this so-called education hub of the country! Every morning (actually, at any time)when  I am driving to the badminton court & even when the signal is red, most of the drivers, of all age group, gender & profession blatantly jumps (break) the red signal if traffic police is not there! What surprises me is, not just youths but even mothers with their kids in the back-seat clinging to them (needless to say, no helmet) as well grandpas’ also, I see in jumping red signals; what are we teaching to our kids, right from their childhood, time to ask this question to ourselves! Joke is, when asked about jumping red signals like basic law following rules, the reasoning given is, if we don’t move ahead the bigger vehicles from behind keep honking & many a times threaten to dash us & this also is true!

This is where the second aspect of my sharing comes in picture (unfortunately, Govt again), as people are no more afraid of law & its power to punish, is the worst thing that is happening to the society! As in both these accident cases, there was CC Tv footage available as well the farmer guy was caught on the spot by the crowd around so further actions were possible but why our laws are repeatedly failing to make masses respect or say being afraid of them, is the question! Answer is, weak (I won’t say corrupt as that’s not me to judge) law enforcement system including judicially also which has age old traffic laws & weak system which keeps these cases dragging for years to take away the fear of punishment from the mind of the accused involved in the accident matters! And there always is a third aspect, (sorry breaking my oath) which is, poor traffic infrastructure (less manpower), roads with potholes, break down in signal systems, poor public transport making private vehicles choke the road widths & the list is unending! The silver lining was society coming forward & pushing the accident matter (especially the stray dog one) in the media as well with the authorities & police having booked the concerned drivers! This is the way, as it's your & my life as well lives of our close ones, may it be even a dog, & if we don’t stand for that life then how can we expect the govt will stand for our lives, right?

Yes, and the third incidence was of a clip of a tiger on social media which has got injured by dash of a vehicle around forest in western part of our State & the poor fellow helplessly dragging its body across road in the injured condition, which later died due to those injuries, is the news I got! Again, it’s about attitude of the drivers (read as society), as when we are driving through forests at least if govt don’t have funds or money to build right kind of roads through the forests to save wildlife, we can control our speed & do that, right? Who is going to teach us the basic mantra of life, “Jio aur Jine Do,” is the question I want to ask all of us today on this day, where a dog is unsafe, a tiger is unsafe & a human boy (all three are dead) is also unsafe on the roads which we only have built & use for our driving comforts; till then RIP, Don the stray Dog, the unknown Boy & the Tiger far away from us in some forest! 

https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cv6wMljJQh1/?igshid=MTc4MmM1YmI2Ng==

jago punekars jago

--

Sanjay Deshpande 

Sanjeevani Dev.

Please view my sharing about real estate in Pune at You Tube link below..

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4xX7eopH5o&t=5s

 

Please do visit my blog links below to read about real estate & home buying! 

https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2023/01/defining-good-home-real-estate-in-2023.html

http://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2023/02/blog-post.html

Creating Togetherness; team Sanjeevani Way (Click link below) 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/65629150@N06/albums/72157627904681345

For any of your complaints about city, log in at link below

www.punecorporation.org

Take your issues to Hon PM at link below..

https://secure.mygov.in/

Think Green, Think Life

www.sanjeevanideve.com / https://junglebelles.in/

Ground Water, DC Rules, Developments & Fate of City!

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“It’s only after you’ve stepped outside your comfort zone that you begin to change, grow, and transform.”
― Roy T. Bennett

And I think when the subject is of policies, rules, by-laws, its high time our govt agencies (read as PMC/PCMC/PMRDA/UD & all) must understand & adopt wise words of Mr. Bennett as it’s good to be in our comfort zone but you never know when the honeymoon time ends & before you realize entire world is shattered, that’s why change is important & more important is timing of the change! Now if you are confused as what this sharing is about then it’s not about a couple relationship but about the relationship of the city at large & its rulers! Yes, this relation matters very much as a city is indeed a living thing because it is made by living objects & not just dead structures, is a very basic fact which our most urban planners fail to understand. Outcome is our failure on fronts of many civic issues & of which traffic & water are in race to get number one position & sure in the summers water always beats traffic & this water is my subject of sharing! Recently I became part of  Ground Water Cell, formed by PMC & many of us may not be knowing (read as are ignorant) but for millions of citizens of this city ground water is the only source of water supply or else they have to buy tanker water which is not very pocket friendly for a middle-class family. Ground Water about which we never think or care about because those who get water by tap (PMC) hardly need it & those who are not that fortunate are not having knowledge about it so once they get possession can hardly do anything about ground water & silently keep paying for tanker lobby cursing their bad-luck on water supply front! This is why I thought about taking this subject (and not for my oath of not writing about city or infra).

As this year’s (2023) summer got extended & dams went dry, the entire city was facing acute water supply problems, the need of this best source (and free) of water came to light which is why Ground Water Cell was formed & during its ongoing meetings various aspects came forward. First is, making people understand the importance of groundwater as a source & second is making policies which will ensure ground water storage remains intact for the use  as well as increases by methods we implement for the same. Unfortunately, when the things started being discussed then we realized the scene is grave than we can imagine as it’s not just the ignorance or less knowledge of the masses about ground water but the policies as well regulations of the developments in & around the city are the major concern! All around the city three major aspects are damaging the groundwater, one is concretization which directly reduces rain water percolating into the ground, rampant tree cutting for various purposes which reduces water holding capacity of the soil & third is basements which are being dug for the parking requirements of the new developments!

So, it's decided that detailed study of the policies is needed & changes have to be done in the policies as its high time to decide whether we need parking or water & on top of it there are aspects like fire safety norms etc. which are colliding with ground water related policies! So, here are some solutions which I thought are worth sharing, as somewhere someone can act!

First & foremost, as an engineer as well planner (and builder too) let me clarify basement is the last thing any engineer will want for his building as its costly, safety issues like flooding are always there & it makes services such as drainage lines extremely difficult to maintain in the future! It's only because of contradictory provisions in our building by laws one has to go for basements, though I agree there is no environmental aspect to basement facility by most builders because they are not aware about is one aspect & second is real estate is a business & not science, & any business is driven by the needs of the customers, which in Pune’s case is parking when its real estate!

And on top of it our illogical provisions in the DC rules for parking which makes people to provoke them to buy for more car parks is another aspect as well our extremely poor public transport (and free parking on the roads) policies which makes people not restricting themselves or forced to buy more vehicles! All these factors makes need in the building to make as many parking you can & when its redevelopment the issue is grave because all the existing members demands at least two car parks & in central city area where a two bhk flat also costs more than one & half crore, the new buyers also asks for two car parks per flat & from where you are going to make provisions for all these cars, is the question in-front of the builder (and for architect/ designer/ engineer).

Digging basements directly hits two fronts of water management, one is it stops (not just reduces) rain water percolation over the area of the project thus affecting ground water storage adversely & at the same time all this rain water becomes runoff increasing chances of flash floods even with minimum of rains, which we are witnessing now! The borewells are going dry & smallest of rains are causing our roads to flood & one more aspect, loss of soil cover causing biodiversity loss along which again is reducing water holding capacity of the soil in the central part of the city! And if we don’t take some real practical (read as radical) steps to change our by-laws then we will soon be faced with some disaster on the water front for sure!

First & most important, reduce car parking norms & make it compulsory that existing flat holders in redevelopment project can possess only one car park! As well in TOD Zone there is provision of making 50% flats of smaller area for Metro use but in doing this, we are increasing density of the central part of the city & that means more car parking & as plots are smaller the only way parking needs can be fulfilled is by going for basements! We must encourage bigger flats or bigger spaces in central parts then only the need for car parks will be less! And PMC can make public parking  on the amenity spaces it has acquired in newly merged villages from today itself thus projects around those parking can be tagged under a separate category with minimum parking provisions, this has been done in most of the down-towns of European cities!

Second, why we don’t allow podium by keeping 1.5 m margin if we can allow the basements & ask for fire tower which is any way mandatory for high rise buildings with 18 floors & above, so any way the fire engine won’t be necessary here the why not give all the parking above the ground only with no need of basement. Don’t consider these parking floors in the height for Fire NOC or even if you consider then don’t ask for the fire engine thing to move all around the building, which is of no use practically, this has been adopted all over the world to avoid basements! Because on one side building permission dept. considers height of the building without parking floors & gives height accordingly while the fire dept. considers parking floor height too & applies their norms, this is where the builder has to go in the ground than going up for balancing parking needs & FSI consumption!

Third is, no parking in side margins policy needs to redrafted, as if there is drive way to pass other cars what is the harm in keeping parking within margins also as in case of the fire any way people will move away their cars & as I said check the history of Pune’s fire incidences in the past fifty years (related to the residential buildings especially) & study the patterns & then make a policy which will be rational to balance safety & needs of the industry, which is not happening today is a fact! As we have one or two fire engines & to accommodate them, we are holding the entire city’s ground water at stake; actually, the buildings should be self-fire resistant should be the focus of fire as well building norms.

Fourth is, allow open wells in the open spaces to accumulate rain water as well to charge the ground water & give enough incentives to the societies which conserves ground water as well use it instead of PMC water supply. Give special water TDR also to such buildings which are self-sufficient on charging as well utilizing ground water for their needs. We can make a special category of ground water Conserving Buildings & make parking as well as fire norms separate for them to start, so we can actually check whether the policies we made are being utilized for the right cause & not being misused. A periodical monitoring system also needed to be in place for this aspect.

Friends, ground water aspect which we have to deal needs utmost importance as well planning before execution as for thousands of year this phenomenon is part of nature’s cycle which we have interrupted under the name of development & indeed, no growth is possible without the development yet if we don’t make right (and bold too) policies then developments will be still there but whether it will lead us to growth or death, time only will only decide; though I know the answer by myself, do you? Adios with this note!

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Check few things which we have done at our projects for ground water restoration at the link below...

https://www.flickr.com/photos/65629150@N06/albums/72177720309889298

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Sanjay Deshpande 

Sanjeevani Dev.

Please view my sharing about real estate in Pune at You Tube link below..

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4xX7eopH5o&t=5s

 

Please do visit my blog links below to read about real estate & home buying! 

https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2023/01/defining-good-home-real-estate-in-2023.html

http://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2023/02/blog-post.html

Creating Togetherness; team Sanjeevani Way (Click link below) 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/65629150@N06/albums/72157627904681345

For any of your complaints about city, log in at link below

www.punecorporation.org

Take your issues to Hon PM at link below..

https://secure.mygov.in/

Think Green, Think Life

www.sanjeevanideve.com / https://junglebelles.in/