Who moved my trees II ?

Take a look at the almost - Kwoi pond and guess where could I be ?


Obviously following from the last post you will guess it's yet another nook of my green,so green neighborhood.


No.


Look at the pics below and guess again.

After the neighborhood, it's time to see what a normal college in Kolkata looks like. Actually, that's not entirely accurate. Anyone who has been to Varanasi and taken the long, really long walk around the BHU campus knows what I am talking about. Fellow Podarites and sundry Mumbaikars. Colleges around the world are not always buildings with classrooms where bored students and their boring teachers saunter in and out of. Labs and libraries aren't always rooms and a garden is not a 10 feet by 25 feet plot with ugly grass and weeds interspersed with the odd flowers.If you look through colleges like the ones in the U.S. or Europe, the average college campus is the size of a small town, students cycle a kilometer to class, each subject has it's own building and group study does not mean greasy meals in the canteen but a group of students huddled together chewing on their pens in the shade of sturdy trees and well manicured gardens. Even at Benares Hindu University I was left with my jaw hanging at the well planned campus layout, the beautiful lawns and almost Boston-esque feel. 


I felt betrayed and cheated.


A die-hard romantic-quasi nature lover and pseudo intellectual, I would have died for a college experience that dripped the romance of cycling across campus, studying in the company of rose bushes and ogling crushes from behind the secure cover of trees. But just like our neighborhoods, our colleges are a real estate conspiracy. Even the older ones that could have demanded more land from the government settled for a hasty pudding because quite frankly if our homes aren't green why should our colleges be ? Why not allot the space to real estate developers who can actually squeeze every paisa's worth from every cubic millimeter. Why shoulder costs of scenic beauty and tranquility for a bunch of students ?


I pinched myself for the 10 th time as I sat strumming my Spanish Guitar under a tree next to a lotus  pond. I was let in the sprawling university campus adorned with graffiti, not so much as an ID check even as I clicked away to my hearts content. There were buildings for the Arts, Commerce and Science streams. And then when I came to the building that housed the Heat and Power Lab I felt like I had been slapped across my face. A building for experiments in heat and power, in the middle of prime South Kolkata property.


Friends, our government has made fools out of us, they have taken our basic rights and made a mockery of town and infrastructure planning. I doubt I will ever be able to look at our skyline with the same fondness now that I know I have been cheated out of simple natural beauty and space. 


Meanwhile,  I am waiting for Aamir to bring up this elephant of a fraud involving deep pockets and political mafia on his show. 


But I know the wait could be forever ......