Rape of the hills

Sunil R Nair
13 February 2003

In an age where open space is more valuable than gold, the thought of losing the hills, which are omnipresent as one drives around the city, is a horror which one will have to accept unless something drastic is done immediately.

Anu Tideman, a jazz artist from Pune, informed me one afternoon that she was going to attend a protest to save the hills in the city from destruction and asked me if I would be interested in joining the group. I have spent most of my life in the city and had spent much of my college days trekking in the hills around Pune.

Fist of fury
The very thought of a few buildings coming up in the place of the verdant hills stoked enough fury for me to attend. This was the first time that I was getting involved in my capacity as a writer in a social cause and I was apprehensive. This was put to rest by the atmosphere under the clear blue canopy of the new born summer evening, the heady feeling of creativity and music that reverberated from the nearby hills.

Citizens’ Initiative Against Deforestation (CAID), formed to protect the hills and slopes from de-reservation, has been actively gaining support from the people of Pune who wish to have the hills as a monument of the past. Shekhar Bhonagiri, who heads CIAD, explains that the Pune Municipal Corporation has chosen to absolve itself from protecting the hills and has, instead, followed the logic of having concrete buildings instead of the slums that might otherwise come up.

He says instead of making efforts to conserve the hills and keep them alive, the administration has chosen to take the easy way out. He adds that if tomorrow the administration feels that the Shaniwar Wada, the seat of the Peshwas, is difficult to maintain they might consider razing it to the ground and build a shopping complex in its place.

Taking the fight to the citizens has proven to be a blessing. In the first public outburst since the Development Plan (DP) was made available, hundreds of children, elder citizens and youngsters gathered on 2 February 2003 to register their protest. Eminent artists like Murli Lahoti and Vaishali Oak converted a bare canvas into a work of art tentatively titled as ‘How much is enough?’ Lahoti explained that art is close to nature and this was his way of sending a message to the people that they are concerned about the city that they live in.