After almost two decades, I have an occasion to walk across the bank of Chandigarh Sukhna Lake. I realise that it is ageing faster than I do. Silt seems to have choked its arteries, while dry patches show up like a boney rib-cage. It has gone pale. Its pristine glow is missing. Deforestation in the catchment area has taken its toll. A coffin-like layer of muddy water drapes it.
Birds, except a few, who nestled in Sukhna’s cool vegetation have given it a slip. Wild life on its other side has distanced itself by receding in to the quiet Shivaliks. Jarring sound of a loud speaker showering religious sermons drowns the soothing melody of sparkling ripples that the gentle breeze cretes. Chirping birds have lost their voice.
In its ugliest ecological manifestation, technology has crucified the Sukhna ambience. Three communication towers ominously strut up in the lake’s background. The nature’s canvas displaying captivating pictorial view of the Kasauli Hills has been sullied. These towers symbolise Ravana, Meghnath and Kumbhkarna in their connotation of an ultimate ecological evils. Lord Rama of the modern day, rather than liberating Sukhna from these demons, appears to look the other way.
The Chandigarh Police Beat Box right at the lake gateway is another scar on the lake’s face. It does serve some purpose nevertheless as I saw a harassed young mother terrifying her restless kid by pointing towards the police beat box as a place meant to beat up unruly kids.
I remember the quiet days when meek suggestions of demand for playing soft instrumental music to break monotony of a long walk were frowned upon. There are now the jarring sounds of loud music from adjoining clubs, besides a religious place showering sermons. The serenity of Sukhna is taken away by the millions of decibels of deafening sound emitted by the low flying state helicopters hovering over it before landing at the nearby Rajindra Park.
It is quite heartening that Sukhna still offers its lap to those deprived of legitimate privacy at home, or the ones lacking capacity to afford the permissive environs of the City’s elitist eateries. Cuddling couples at the lake bank still muster courage to defy the rude gaze of morality watchdogs.
Thanks to a variety of hair colours now available, the traditional salt and pepper style of the middle aged seems missing. Its golden all over, with shades of rust and brown in between.
Obesity has invaded the City; which shows itself in every third woman with a disproportionate cleavage making a vain effort to shed a lot of pounds through violent, though out of rythem movements of hips while men with bloated bellies walk across.
If there is one official notification that negates elitism, a warning-board at the Sukhna forbids the presence of pet dogs, whatever be the quotable pedigree of the pet or the VIP status of its owner, which leaves the lake’s precious charms wide open to the less privileged stray dogs.
However, tables are turned when it comes to the homo-sapiens. While I sit on a bench after finishing my walk and turn around to have a look at the people still approaching Sukhna’s gateway, I am amused by the ego balloons having converted anything on four wheels, be it a Maruti 800, Indica, Sumo or a Toyota, in to flagships of sorts, flying multi-coloured flags with an enormous variety of imprints such as a pair of spectacles, lotus, scales, hand, and so on. Some others have explicitly displayed their designation such as Chairman of a religious trust or a Municipal Councillor of some muffassil town in Haryana or a Zaildar from a Malwa village in Punjab. There are still others who have highlighted their pedigree on Jeep bumpers with such notifications as “Putt Jattan De”, i.e; son of a Jat. VIP convoys with jarring hooters meander the Sukhna road in a tearing hurry while the policemen blowing whistles with full pulmonary strength scare away the lesser mortals.
Sukhna is mercifully free of crocodiles. None from the City has made Sukhna its abode!
*(Authored by Sarvesh Kaushal while hybernating as Member Secretary of the Punjab Women Commission) in 2007
