Karma yogis of Mumbai

19^th June 2015 – exactly a year ago, Mumbai witnessed heavy rains and there was waterlogging in many low-lying areas. Matunga are King’s Circle are among the first areas to get affected and sometimes severely. Last year, too, many parts of our area were badly affected.

I had a training program at Goa and had to take the early morning flight from Mumbai to Goa. I had called for a Meru cab at 3:45 in the morning. At around 3:30 AM, I got a call from the taxi driver from Meru that he cannot come due to waterlogging. I was angry as I could not see any waterlogging from my window (incidentally, the part I can see from my window is not low-lying and the other side is not visible). A lot of discussion followed between me and the cab driver, who refused to come inside our complex and finally said, if you want to go to the airport, you will have to come to the cab.

I had no choice. I went out of the house with my travel bag, my laptop bag and an umbrella. The cab driver was right about the waterlogging, which I could not see from my window.

The moment I was out of our complex, the water touched my ankles. A little distance and my knees were under water. I kept wading my way through. I walked some more distance and now the water was almost touching my wallet that I keep in my pant’s front pocket. It was just a little short of waist-high. I could finally manage to reach the cab and make it to the airport in time.

This is not about me. This is about some other people.

Now let us see what had happened. It rained heavily during the night. Mumbai received equivalent of 10 days’ rain in 24 hours. Of course, many areas, especially the low-lying ones, were under water. Near my house, a big tree had fallen on the road, further blocking the traffic.

However, at 3:50 in the morning, there were police and BMC workers were present at the situation diverting the traffic (whatever littler there was at that hour) and clearing the mess created by the fallen tree as well as the water.

The driver from Meru cab was present to pick me up.

The next day I received messages from some friends complaining about the conditions. There were so many messages on social media cribbing about what the BMC should have done.

I think some of those who sat in their houses and complained had no idea about what the BMC and police staff were actually doing on the ground. I am sure many of the commentators did not venture out due to the rains and hence did not know that the ones whom they were criticizing were actually out working to clean up the mess.

My head bowed down to those silent workers carrying out their thankless duty at an unearthly hour. I missed the opportunity to publicly acknowledge this earlier, but thought the anniversary of the incident may be the best time to do so.

I would also like to mention about the cab driver, who was there in spite of the rains.

These are the true Karmayogis.