Team India & the Art of Saving Test Match!

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“Test Cricket teaches you patience, discipline and team work.”… Shakil Kamboh

“Cricket is such a sport that you get to learn something from someone every day”… Ravindra Jadeja

“The beauty of Test cricket is all about playing an opponent in their backyard or defending home turf under challenging conditions over five days - dominating each session, dominating each day, picking 20 wickets to win a contest. That's historically been cricket's most fascinating gift’… Ravi Shastri

This is amazing game test cricket & I am sure just the way few readers must frowning by the mention of Tadoba in my sharing same must be the feeling for mention of cricket, the only difference may be lesser numbers of frowning faces for cricket as in this country this game is loved beyond any boundaries of caste, gender & religion! And as I have repeatedly mentioned I love all games (ground games more) but I love test match format of cricket most as the fitness of mind & body it needs to pull yourself through grind of five days & when the series is of five test matches then one has to retain all his or her energies for span of nearly forty days at stretch! Tell me the name of any other game where one team has to go through such stress for such a long period! And when you are playing for a country with one fifty crores plus population which loves cricket more than their religion then add the burden of expectations of all these people (read as fans) in to the stresses & suddenly its no more just a match of a game, it’s a war of survival for you also as a player, as a human being! As this war, if can make you a hero overnight then it can make you worse than a zero also, we all have seen it happening to the young players & even to the senior players also. Best part of the game to watch as a balanced fan (self-proclaimed phrase) is, you learn everyday from every player by watching this war without bleeding by yourself!

Ok, leaving gyan.com aside for a while, India England test series is being played in England since last thirty days & is in deciding mode & there can be only two result possible, the series can be drawn or England will win & you will say what’s fun then as anyways India isn’t going to win & you are right! But if you are having such a question then you haven’t understood the game in the first place & you are a blind fan as every time winning is not everything, especially in the test match format of the game! Do you know why test match cricket is special or how this particular format of game is different from mostly all the games played in the history of sports? To my knowledge of sports test match cricket is the only sport where a match can  result in a draw meaning no team wins or loses, do you know any such game where the result can be a draw. There can be a tie in many games but there is a difference between a tie & a draw, as a tie is score equal & even in a tournament both teams of players get equal points but a draw is no team wins or necessarily has equal points or score, this is the funniest part of test match circlet & interesting by me! And on top of it, one of the team can actually fight to make the match draw i.e. without any result & needed to do herculean efforts even for that, this can happen only in test cricket & that’s why I like test cricket, not for just the game aspect of it but the grind & efforts needed to achieve the result like a draw!

So, out of four test matches which has been played till now between both teams, two has been won by England & one has been won by India & the fourth test was in such state that India would have lost it as per the most fans & that means series would have been already lost making fifth test match a formality! But team India fought hard to save the match from getting lost & succeeded in drawing the match, keeping their challenge alive as they can win the last match & draw the series & keep England away from winning the series! And while doing this many records were breaking as well Indian players showed unique displays of grit, dedication, toughness of character & fitness, & watching that display is my learning which is my subject of sharing! As, first of all, when this test series started nobody thought the series will be pulled up to the last test for the result, even if a draw series, which itself is a morale victory for this team India & the way every test match has been fought till now is also something the cricketing world (just like “wizarding world” in Harry Potter saga, plz google) is yet to believe, such was the show by team India! In this era of T20 cricket where most test matches are getting finished in three or four days, here is a series where every match till now has gone to the last day & to the last session, that’s what test cricket is supposed to be! The story doesn’t end here as test matches are not about winning or losing, they are about in the ability of drawing them too & that needs hail of determination, fitness & patience, is something which most of the cricketing world has forgotten, that art is revived or rewritten by this series, is something very special, is my subject of sharing! And after four matches i.e. twenty days of game when the fifth test is knocking at your door, the scene is nearly fifty percent of players are down with injuries, which includes the athletic captain of England team also, such was the grind of this series!

And what was most fascinating is rejuvenation of the famous, “Indian Art of Saving Test Match” as till few decades back when Indian team was not supposed to be a strong contender for winning then all our efforts were put in at least to draw the test match if not lose it & with batsmen like Sunil Gavaskar, Chetan Chauhan, Anshuman Gaikwad, Vijay Hajare, Dilip Vengsarkar, Ajit Wadekar, G. Vishwanath & many such it’s a battle which is for saving the match if not winning. What it meant is day long the batsmen used to bat patiently leaving the deliveries than playing it, tiring the bowlers & finally the time used to end & so dies the match! This is very easy on face as one will say what’s big deal as you don’t have to play the balls but leave them & this needs patience, determination & judgement of the bowling as well pitch, especially when you are playing on pitches of England & not your flat dead pitches. And this is why the Indian team's track record of playing in England is poor even in making the games draw! But, this time the scene was different, the fourth test match showed that India still has got that ability to draw a match & all what’s needed to achieve such a result. With nearly 350 plus runs lead to cover & then make England play in second innings (plz google for rules of test match game as I wont waste words & time on it) team India needed to play nearly 140 overs & two days to face pepped up English bowling attack & one of the star batsmen is injured means practically only five specialized batsmen were there, two all rounders & four bowlers! And in the first over you have lost two wickets for a duck & in such a situation all that is left is in how many overs we will be out of the battle! This is where team India stood for the challenge & the four batsmen tired the entire English attack by just not giving their wicket! Guys, we applaud fitness of tennis stars when a five-setter match is played but here it's nearly fourteen hours the players need to be on field & face bowling where a leather ball (not tennis ball) meets you at 140 km / hour relentlessly. Add sledging in it, (comments) by fielders surrounding you & you know your wicket means your team is one step near to defeat & you keep playing with a burden of 150 crore plus hopes to save the match as winning is not an option, such is the scoreboard!

And then this was a team with no legends in the squad except a bowler named Bummrah, rather for the first time a team has gone for five test match battle without any big name in batting for which team India was famous for & that’s why the way this battle has been played it has carved a special place in the entire Indian Cricket history & not just test match history! It was heartening the way KL Rahul, Gill, Jadeja & Washington played & needless to say when you put on such a show, the records do tumbles, history is rewritten & even a draw looks like a big victory, which did happen. In the process of drawing the match Shubhamn Gill has already made his place among names like Sunil Gavaskar, Garry Sobers & Don Bradman, a feat which even the biggest names of Indian cricket haven’t achieved! More than records what you earn out of such game is, self-confidence & respect, it’s such die-hard games which makes heroes out of boys, it makes super stars out of masses & it gives hope to your team & billions of fans & most importantly it sends positive vibes in the people’s mind that if we give our best then we can achieve anything, which this fourth drawn test match has given & my sharing is for that outcome! Go on team India, keep fighting with your best strength which is your determination & records will follow for sure & thanks for inspiring people like me who are lucky to witness the way you fight, adios with this note!

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Sanjay Deshpande 

smd156812@gmail.com

Sanjeevani Dev.

Please view my sharing about finding a Right Home/ Office in Pune, at YouTube link below & share if liked...

 

https://youtu.be/27j3I3rwGPQ?si=-ODYBxVI2Dl_C345

 

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

https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2024/12/right-home-buying-in-2025.html

https://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2024/12/2025.html

Creating Togetherness; team Sanjeevani Way (Click link below) 

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Hotels, Traffic Chaos, Garbage & Hypocrisy

 

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“For the powerful, crimes are those that others commit.”
― Noam Chomsky

“I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wicked and being good all the time. That would be hypocrisy.”
― Oscar Wilde

Avram Noam Chomsky, which may seem a Russian name yet is very much American, has been a professor and public intellectual known for his work in linguistics, political activism, and social criticism. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy. And Oscar Wilde is a name which everybody who has even the slightest exposure with English literature knows, such is his work. And America is known for its critics who have brain & thinking power & courage to raise voice even against their own, when found wrong. I am deliberately saying wrong & not guilty as when the subject is about infrastructure & society, things can’t be judged to frame somebody guilty as that’s not the purpose, it's about right & wrong which remains the same irrespective of govt, laws, & society as well time! I have seriously given up writing about civic issues as many pens & mikes keep doing it & others says no use but somewhere deep within some hope is still alive in me & more than that when I came across reading such quotes from the greats, I remind myself, if I feel then I must express as that’s one sign of being alive! Problem is, today most people express (thanks to reel mania) whatever they want without thinking, just because they can express & those who seriously think they refrain themselves from expressing due to many aspects, one is fear of backlash about expression, especially expressing right things!

Ohk, sorry for deviation but subject is traffic of Pune & garbage & reason is two news stories (as usual) which caught my attention & made me keep aside my frustration & express or say share! First news was about answer by our State’s Hon CM in assembly session about a question asked by MLA & a petition by residents of Kalyani-Nagar, a decent suburb locality (plz google) about the traffic chaos they are facing due to illegal permit rooms, restaurants & bars in the locality. And another news was about covering citizen’s comments for PMC (Pune Municipal Corporation) getting high ranking in the country for Swachh Abhiyan (Cleanliness drive) & PCMC (Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation) being top ranked in state for same i.e. on cleanliness index! Well, I am sure most people will stop reading here as they will say, we knew, these are routine things & nothing will happen & let’s spend our time doing something more important than this sharing (read as watching reels) & I don’t blame them! Because this, nothing will change, attitude is the real crux of both the news (and many such aspects but sometime next about it) as Hon CM, with figures & facts (well he was speaking in assembly) discarded the plea of Kalyani-Nagar residents saying, not a single pub or restaurant in the locality is illegal, even if they are being run in some bungalows, yet they are with all proper permissions & legal! And he produced a record of complaints about traffic chaos in this locality & they were below ten in numbers in the entire two years (again, on record he said), so no question arises about traffic jams being caused because of these eating joints is what Hon CM said, matter closed! Will take on garbage news later but first let’s look at facts & reply of Hon CM about traffic jams causing eateries first in Kalyani-Nagar & then all around the city!

Before going into the news & hon CM’s stand on the petition of Kalyani Nagar residents, lets see what was the scene, some fifteen / twenty years back here. Kalyani-Nagar was considered as one of the up-market areas with a mix of bungalows & few high end residential apartment buildings, it was a planned layout with cross lanes connecting the main road of Kalyani Nagar & Nagar Road which connects Pune to the north-east part of State & the country. And beyond this locality starts Chandan Nagar, Viman Nagar, Wagholi i.e. Outer Pune. Most affluent citizens preferred Kalyani Nagar as a calm, quiet, green suburb yet well-connected area to the main city especially Koregaon park & camp & airport.  And then areas beyond Kalyani Nagar started being developed as IT Hubs of East Pune i.e. Kharadi & industries also started growing in Ranjangaon which tough was some fifty kilometers away then & now has become part of Pune actually & all these developments started attracting not just rich, effluent, senior, well settled in life but younger genre who got job in all these commercial hubs & has money to spend but no outlets for that & here the trigger got pulled. In the last two decades Kalyani Nagar became the best target for all sorts of eating/ drinking outlets as connoisseurs were there for the same & in numbers & for all types of joints. The locality has ample road side parking places, bungalows with space for posh & semi posh food/ drink joints, the locality is connected to the city as well suburbs, what more you need to make a flourishing business out of all such set up, right? And today Kalyani Nagar offers probably the widest eating options to every segment of society & the problem started for the residents of Kalyani Nagar! Because, the missing thing is, the right urban planning to accommodate this floating crowd & right public transport, resulting in too many vehicles coming at a particular locality at same time; what else can you expect but traffic chaos? Add in that, the regular commuters through these main roads up & down (to & from), either to work or to home, making a perfect example of a traffic mess which no traffic police will be ever able to handle! And then thanks to our “free parking on roads policy” as in entire world in no other city public roads are considered as free parking the way its in Pune city, so all these hoteliers have to do is, employ some drivers for valet parking & then customers are happy just to handover the keys to the valet & enjoy the evening! There are gangs of valet parkers who work in synchronized pattern; these valet teams have two wheelers which they park in such fashion that other customers or people with four-wheeler driver can’t park in the free parking space on the roads & only when a valet driven car comes the two-wheeler guy removes his two-wheeler from the parking lot to accommodate valet gang’s car! This is a common scene around & though legally this can't be considered as crime but morally it is & the only way out is "No Free Parking" anywhere in the city on the roads which our dear govt doesn’t act on & nor the residents of this city demand it, this is why we are biggest hypocrites!

The real problem of Pune’s traffic is not just poor urban planning or public transport or wrong policies or policing, the real problem is our hypocritic attitude towards the traffic as everybody is interested in only their own convenience or comfort & blame others for any discomfort. Everyday morning when I go to my badminton game, on every signal if traffic police is not around then most vehicles don't obey red signals & jump over! And we blame traffic police for incapable policing but in no other country there exists a traffic police where signals are on because citizens respect signals which we don’t! And it's not just about jumping red signals, everyday we (read as citizens) park our vehicles under no parking board, on footpaths & we only oppose the Pay & Park policy. Agreed, our public transport is poor but we have no patience to wait at a signal for one minute, how can we be patient to wait even for ten minutes at a bus stop, right? Public transport will never be at our service at our will the way our two-wheeler or four-wheeler does but then if fifty lakh citizens think in this way then its fifty lakh vehicles on road to which no traffic management or road network can handle, that’s why we are hypocrites, is my point of sharing!  And then we blame hotels/ restaurants for traffic chaos but in my society every evening I see Zomato/ Swiggie delivery people getting parcels to the residents, do we ever think where these parcels are coming from! As we may not be going to eat out & to jam the roads but the parcel boys do it for us, this we conveniently forget! We want hotels, we want to eat outside & drink & have fun & we want free parking on the roads & we won’t follow traffic rules but we don’t want traffic created by them, who are we fooling, is my point of sharing! This doesn’t mean there won’t be any solution, what this means is, traffic chaos won’t be solved by just shutting few food joints but we need to execute the solution from all the ends in which each of us has a role to play & unless we as citizens won’t accept this till that time it will be just hypocritic blame game!

Now about the other news i.e. garbage or Swachh Abhiyan ranking of the city. Most of the cities have wet garbage processing vermicomposting yet in most of the societies it's non-functional & we blame govt for garbage overflowing on road. Leave vermi-composting, many societies don’t even segregate dry & wet garbage & just throw their garbage in garbage collecting vans by PMC & if one day it doesn’t come for any reason, the garbage of the society keeps laying at the entrance or in some duct & we expect the city to remain clean by its own! No society or commercial establishments allows garbage bins or public toilets near their entrance or in their vicinity & reason is PMC doesn’t keep it clean, agreed. We spend millions for our interiors but we don’t come together & collect money & maintain the public lavatory or garbage bin near our society clean, because we pay tax, right? And that’s why we are free to blame PMC or govt for incapability of keeping our city clean. I see everyday people throwing garbage at their will on the roads, in the river & wherever possible but don’t take any effort to segregate it & process in their society, & not just this we even don’t take any efforts to reduce the generation of the garbage itself & yet we expect our city to be clan & curse PMC/ PCMC for failing in their job, this is hypocrisy, is my point of sharing!

I know many of the readers will say, I am also part of such a lot & yes, I am but on a personal note, I try my best not to break any traffic rules & not to make more garbage by myself & try to make others aware, at least that much I can do! Friends, may it be traffic or garbage, if we want to solve the problem then we must accept our part in that problem, till then keep naming others & let the problem multiply, adios with this note (warning)!

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Sanjay Deshpande 

smd156812@gmail.com

Sanjeevani Dev.

Please view my sharing about finding a Right Home/ Office in Pune, at YouTube link below & share if liked...

 

https://youtu.be/27j3I3rwGPQ?si=-ODYBxVI2Dl_C345

 

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

https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2024/12/right-home-buying-in-2025.html

https://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2024/12/2025.html

Creating Togetherness; team Sanjeevani Way (Click link below) 

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

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Think Green, Think Life

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Choti Tara, Maya & Deja Vu of Tadoba!

 

                                        

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“Deja Vu confirms a faithful path worth taking.”
― T.F. Hodge

Hodge American born & stays in Los Angeles, & is writer of “From Within I Rise” named self-healing book! Why I used his above words, because that's what this sharing is about (oh yes, there is Tadoba in it, vaidhanik ishara) & that’s one word which I have been most intrigued, since long time & that is, Déjà Vu (not tadoba)! I love reading & I take pride in declaring most of life’s hour I have spent in reading & like a tiger in a forest, my reading has no boundaries as from Tintin to Zen to Sherlock Holms to Chacha Chaudhari to Sigmund Freud (plz google for all of these) I read anything & often I have encountered this Déjà vu thing, I always wondered the way google auto correct it as I can’t even type that thing! Though I have understood what it means at large as today you can get definition of any word & there are many assistants from Alexa to Google baba to Gemini & many such yet there are some terminologies which are not mere set of alphabets but is a phenomenon & this Déjà vu is sure one such, this much I have understood about it. In simple words Déjà vu is a scenario or situation where you can connect it with your past, something very similar about what you are living in present, its just flashing incidence & the similarity can be with place, with the persons, characters involved or set up of the place you are in. Something of the above or all of them makes you feel you have lived these very moments in very similar fashion, it’s not history repeating it’s your own life’s moments you are living again, type feel! 

It's said that every time you visit a forest it looks different, even the same spots with the same trees also gives you a different feel in a single day & Tadoba is no exception to this law of the wilds! Yet interestingly, you find similarity between the events as the place is the same, timing is the same, you are some but the characters may be different & in the back of your mind you keep thinking, you have lived these moments earlier, right here yet the excitement is the same, rather its more with every trip! As in forests few things don’t change such as some tree along the road which has witnessed so many incidences, the tree has stood over the markings of different tigers as average age of a tiger in the wild is fourteen to fifteen years & that too a tiger can keep a particular territory (read as defend the territory) hardly for six or seven years i.e. when its in prime age. As the tiger or tigress grow old, younger tigers take their respective place but the tree remains the same, witness of the transition & same is with a water body in that territory. The dusty paths are one more witness of tiger’s dynasties & all of these are part of our Déjà vu moments as they become the canvas of our stories! That's why we discussed the Deja Vu effect where you feel like you have experienced a set of incidents earlier also & this Tadoba trip gave me many of them, here are few of them!!

Cut 1:

Choti Tara sitting on Pandharpauni water hole road which was earlier territory of legendary Maya tigress & where I have clicked Maya with her cub nearly ten years back, in the same pose I saw Choti tara & her sub adult cub. Road was same, pose of sitting of maya was same, the cub walking towards her affectionately, was same; even two gypsies in the frame on the background, was same. The only difference was, it's Choti Tara this time & slight change of angle for clicking for me. When I saw Maya, she was facing me & the cub’s face was hidden behind, here Choti Tara’s face was hidden behind the cub but the entire setting was the same, a perfect Déjà vu!

Cut 2 :

At 97 No. water-hole I saw a young male Tiger lazing on a hot noon. This particular water hole is the favourite hanging spot of two/ three male tigers as mainly of-late Mowgli named tiger has made this place as his personal pool! At fir we thought its Mowgli only but when the tiger looked at us, we realized it's much younger eyes looking at us, these eyes lack hardness of stare which comes only by the battles you have to fight to survive for long in the forests, which Mowgli has & our guide said, Sir, ye naya male hai, young hai, isse Collerwala kahate hai!  I have clicked Mowgli just two years back & seems slowly the young male is trying his luck with the place as his territory & that’s how forest life moves on. Seems Mr Mowgli is also busy in expanding his territory but the look, the pose the way neck cocked up at the sound of alarm calls of & the rise from the water & the walk, for a movement except size everything was getting repeated & I have lived another Déjà vu moment in Tadoba!

Cut 3 :

It was a hot summer season ending noon, sky was cloudy yet mercury was up & forest was silent. I have agreed to come for this trip for only one reason, to watch Choti Tara grooming her sub adult female cubs & this might be her last litters as she is already nearly fifteen years old & both these cubs are females means when they will grow full then they only will take CT’s (choti tara’s nickname is CT) territory, pushing her in outer jungle where her survival will be very difficult considering age is not on her side now! This thought which does makes me sad, but it made me push aside my workload & I signed up for the trip. And CT didn’t disappoint me, giving us a full show which made me live multiple Déjà vu moments along. I have been clicking & watching Choti tara since last ten years, from her first cubs which includes today’s king of tadoba, Chota Mataka. And present two queens of Tadoba are also CT’s daughters i.e. Bijli & Roma. On the background of lush green grass cover around Pandharapuni water hole while CT walking towards our gipsy & the sub adult cub trailing, I relived the same scene nearly nine years back, with then the cub Chota Matka walking behind her, a perfect Déjà vu!

And then to get CT head on where she was looking in my camera, her eyes which were never glowing but warm (rather loving always), I remembered all those times when I have kept looking at her through the lens, while she walked  head-on towards me & I can see her as a young female, then as a matured lady & today, she is nearly age of a grannie (from tiger’s life span aspect), tired she is & fragile, yet the eyes carries same warmth & confidence! Guys, I have been visiting forests for more than three decades & forest has taught me the brutality of life or say practicality which has helped me in my own life back here in our concrete jungle! Yet this time when my eyes got locked with Choti Tara’s eyes & the look she gave me, like she was telling me, “are you happy now, after clicking me; I am ageing, I know I don’t look anymore the way you have seen me in my prime, now my skin is not shining & my muscles are loose & my bones are weak, my face isn’t beautiful the way it used to be, but my will to give my best is still the same. I will be leaving my legacy here forever in the form of these two girls of mine & they will carry on, take care of them, click them also with the same love & affection the way you have for me” & she disappeared in the woods crossing our gipsy! That was the ultimate Déjà vu of locking eyes with CT, & when I felt camera vision was blurred, I tried to wipe the lens & realized it was not lens problem but my eyes had become watery by the Déjà vu effect of Choti Tara. I wiped tears from my eyes & came out of forest praying for one more Déjà vu to live with CT though I know this is how the wildlife is yet as Mr Hodge has said, Déjà vu is a faithful path, so I am sure I will see CT once again! Apart from Déjà vu moments, I got to see (read as study) the way a tigress teaches her cubs to make their territory, going ahead first, selecting a right tree & then scratching it with nails & urinating for scent & making the cubs follow this! And all this when the mom knows that she will be the victim of this training, that’s what a tigress mom is!

Btw, if you are wondering with names like Mowgli, Collerwala, Maya, Charger, then these are not human characters but a lot more than that, these are tigers whose home is Tadoba & though forest dept doesn’t acknowledge or approve naming tigers but then, the Déjà vu can’t be with the numbers but only with the names & faces behind those names, so be it! Oh yes, needless to say, right from chinkara grazing in the fields along the Samrudhhi Highway to Pied King Fisher’s acrobatics in air to experiencing wonder full Father-Son relation among tigers (Charger & Veerappan), a lot of learnings were there too!

Here are some of the Deja Vu & other moments of Tadoba,

plz check the Flickr link along…

https://www.flickr.com/photos/coexistance_is_the_key/albums/72177720327613768/with/5466058964

-

Sanjay Deshpande 

smd156812@gmail.com

Sanjeevani Dev.

Please view my sharing about finding a Right Home/ Office in Pune, at YouTube link below & share if liked...

 

https://youtu.be/27j3I3rwGPQ?si=-ODYBxVI2Dl_C345

 

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

https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2024/12/right-home-buying-in-2025.html

https://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2024/12/2025.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

Think Green, Think Life

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

Understanding Sustainable Development!

 

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“The most sustainable way is to not make things. The second most sustainable way is to make something very useful, to solve a problem that hasn’t been solved.” – Thomas Sigsgaard

 “Sustainability is no longer about doing less harm. It’s about doing more good.” -Jochen Zeitz

“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's needs, but not every man's greed.”— Mahatma Gandhi

 

Architect from the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts from 1995. Jochen Zeitz is a businessman best known for his work as CEO of Harley-Davidson, Inc., and chairman of LiveWire Inc. Previously Zeitz served as the chairman and CEO of Puma for a long time. And the third name needs no introduction & beauty of that person’s quote is what these two gentlemen from the so-called developed world, have said today about sustainability, Mahatma Gandhi has realized it & said nearly eight decades back years back. And not only Gandhiji has just said or shown concern about sustainability but he started living by it, unlike his western world counterparts, that’s why he is great! Unfortunate fact is, we have the legacy of thinkers like Gandhiji about the environment & nature at large yet we hardly do or have done anything about it rather we are pushing the whole sustainability concept in reverse direction! This is not my subject of sharing, sorry for going off-track (as usual) but the reason about sudden my emotional burst is a call which I received from a friend who works with Environment Ministry & he asked Sanjay, can you tell me what is “Sustainable Development’ & his second question was, what is the term “sustainable materials’’ meant?  I was super happy for two things, first getting called for such question from such a friend, shows I am still an engineer who is more known for academic than just as a builder (this is my self-derived outcome) & second, those questions triggered the thinking mechanism on positive roll which is rare thing now a days, especially in real estate!

I have asked him , how much time you have got for listening answer, as he is a busy person just the way most people in the govt are (no sarcasm, I am referring to people who really work there) & he did truthfully said not much, so in short I tried to explain him sustainable development is like blind men judging an elephant by touching it (plz google for this story) & unfortunately, I too am part of that blind men’s team though I know this much, what I have touched is not a complete elephant & I keep exploring it to understand the elephant in the right way! And I did explain to him what my views are (which is the subject of this sharing) & the second question about Sustainable materials, is like a byproduct of the first question, is also I told him. Sustainable material is, use of what is available in natural form & using it with minimum or no processing! For e.g. making a home with Janbhya Dadgad (Red Stone) in Konkan & covering the roof of it with Naralachya Jhavalya (coconut tree’s branches) & using clay flooring for this home. In all this process you still have to chisel or shape up the stone block, but that’s the minimum, so you can call such home made by sustainable material yet you can’t call it as sustainable development always! He was confused & I smiled as that’s the gugli (bowling term not the person who kept googling all the time; forgive PJ) because I explained, even to use red Stone, you have to dig up earth, an act against nature. At the same time, if the home is not in Konkan region where red-stone is found but somewhere in Central India then also its not sustainable as to carry that stone there is use of petrol or diesel, again anti-environment action. As well, if everybody starts building their respective home in red stone then soon there will be no red stone left in Konkan or anywhere which again is not good for nature, this is the catch!

Hopefully he was satisfied & we said bye, yet the questions kept lingering in my mind as how we can achieve sustainable development of which sustainable material use is just one aspect, & first I thought shrugging that thought as such thoughts, however positive they appears yet ends up with frustrations (read as more frustration) is my experience & yet I know if we don’t act & collectively then its already too late for nature at large, so I started this sharing which is only way I have in my control! First & foremost, I have some very clear (and ruthless) confession, there is nothing like Eco-friendly in this world, especially in civil engg (read as real estate) as often the term used as sustainable development is in reference of nature or say its conservation but it’s just the way a doctor gives you a capsule coated with sweet covering under which bitter medicine is there. And, the sad fact is, here under the sweetness of a name like sustainable we are hiding the bitter reality of damaging nature! As sustainable when used in terms of only nature then anything which is not produced in nature & not being used in the same way is not sustainable for nature! If you are confused then, here is a simple example; a monkey living on tree, eating fruits, drinking water from natural waterbodies or a tiger living in natural cave, eating deer in raw form (no butter chicken or mutton rogan-josh) & drinking water from river or stream, is sustainable living & anything other than this is not sustainable, at least for nature! And till the humans were living by this way of nature we can say it was sustainable living but we are so called most intelligent species & we started evolving (in our term development) by using other means to make our life comfortable or easy & here is where the balance of nature also started changing on wrong side & now nothing we do is Eco Friendly or can be called as sustainable on the front of nature, lets accept this first, is my subject of sharing!

In the famous movie Jungle Book (Disney who else), written by Rudyard Kipling which is a story about humans & animals, interestingly on the background of Central India’s forest, where human boy Mowgli getting trained by Ballu (sloth bear) & Bagira (black leopard), Mowgli helps Ballu to get honey by using ropes to climb at height & burning torch to shoo away honey-bees. Bagira objects to this way of getting food (honey) & warns Ballu, about disturbing the balance of forest. He says, this is not the way sloth bears’ are supposed to get their honey as if everybody starts extracting such excess honey from the beehives then there will be no honey left for bees & other animals which will definitely be a bad omen for the entire forest, this is unsustainability & this is how humans by their so-called innovations have damaged nature’s balance on every front which we have touched & high time for us to understand it before we define or design our so called sustainable development, is my subject of sharing! So, sustainable development is something, by which every stake holder’s life related with that development is going to get a shade better than what it is at present! Once we understand this concept (and agrees to it) then only we can plan sustainable development which can be any man-made thing, right from a bridge to dam to resort to airport to railway line to a mine or an industry, the list is unending, but as I deal with real estate, so let’s focus on making our homes from sustainability angle! So, confession no.2, there is nothing like an eco-friendly building in real estate; all we can say is, less eco-damaging or more eco-damaging! And do mind, nature is not the only stake holder of real estate so when we call it sustainable then its residents (flat buyers), the city, the environment(nature), government (how can we exclude it), & yes, the developer also! Many people will frown with last two factors & question, how can sustainability accommodate these two in development but this is what we must understand as any development if it’s not going to be sustainable for the government then how it can work for longer period & if it’s not sustainable for the developer then how & why he will complete it in the first place!

If you are confused then read today's (10-7-25) newspaper & you will find a whole page full of photos of traffic jams in the city due to rains & you will say 'what's big deal' in it! Well, that’s one sign that the development happening in & around the city it’s not sustainable for the city & it’s not just traffic front but right from water to air quality everything is under pressure & that’s job of the government to make it sustainable but somehow, we are repeatedly failing on that front, means the development is making things difficult for the government, & then can you call it as sustainable, is my question!  Speaking about the developer, you can build a Taj Mahal but if it's unsalable or not viable commercially for the builder, why he will complete it & then no incomplete development is sustainable for any segment, is simple logic! In nut-shell, the development must be sustainable for the maker financially also, when you make sustainable development, this aspect we forget. And for that we must have ease of doing business which is missing totally in real estate right now, but that's a separate subject of sharing!

At the same time any development must add comfort for its residents & the citizens of the city also which means the project must be affordable for the flat buyers & its periodical maintenance costs also must be making them comfortable & not burn holes in their pockets such as expenses for basic things like water supply. And any hole to the pocket means stress to our mind means uncomforting means not sustainable, right? This means whatever you built must be useful to the user (home buyer in case of real estate) from two angles, one is capital investment (cost of home) & second is monthly maintenance cost which includes property tax, electricity bills & housekeeping for the home or else it will keep on making the occupier discomforting means not sustainable & the same is true for the neighbouring residents of the city at large! Bengaluru is classic example of this as few decades back it was one of the best cities for the residents but the development has made life miserable for the existing citizens on the front of traffic jams, water logging during rains & inadequate water supply, this means unsustainable development at large even if some project can be a sustainable project if we restrict the concept only from one or more stakeholders' perspective, is my subject of sharing! This doesn’t mean we stop development or everything is wrong as I am no judge for it all I am saying is it's high time for us to define sustainable development in the right way as then only we can balance all the stakeholders interest instead of making some lives comfortable & others miserable!

And then comes the last aspect, its sustainable lifestyle which Gandhiji was referring to, as agreed we can’t live in natural cave & eat fruits but at the same time, we as user (read as beneficiary) of any development must learn to live in tune with nature which is not happening & then we blame to every other stakeholder for making our life uncomfortable! Right from trying to use public transport or consuming electricity at our will to unnecessary shopping to avoiding simple things such as plucking flowers from flowering trees, so many things we can do to make our life sustainable which we don’t! At the entrance of my building, I have planted many flowering trees such as Champa, Tagar, Jaswand, as flowers of all such trees are very important for honeybees & butterflies, or else in this concrete jungle where they will get food, right? Planting such flowering trees is part of sustainable development too, but every day, the morning-walkers & society’s residents pluck every single flower from these trees leaving nothing for butterflies or honey-bees & this is unsustainable lifestyle, defeating the very purpose of sustainable development, about which nobody thinks or speaks, is my subject of sharing! And only after we understand all such aspects of sustainability then we can not only identify the sustainable materials but can also quantify the use of the same in the sustainable developments! I think, right from making development plans to sanctioning processes to infrastructure making to forming urban development policies to planning of a single project, everything must be looked at with this wider vision about sustainability as then only we can achieve some of it!

Friends, like Bagira the leopard of Jungle Book warned Ballu the Bear, if we mess with nature then destruction is the only way with which nature responds back; if a leopard & sloth-bear can understand sustainability then we, the so called most intelligent species can understand it too, provided we are really intelligent & not vice-versa, adios with this “waidhanik ishara”!

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Sanjay Deshpande 

smd156812@gmail.com

Sanjeevani Dev.

Please view my sharing about finding a Right Home/ Office in Pune, at YouTube link below & share if liked...

 

https://youtu.be/27j3I3rwGPQ?si=-ODYBxVI2Dl_C345

 

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

https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2024/12/right-home-buying-in-2025.html

https://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2024/12/2025.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

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