I have finally discovered why Americans don't walk.
They have no vendors on their footpaths.
I went for a morning walk in a little American town and was quite disappointed. There wasn't a single man selling roasted peanuts. Nobody offered me sunglasses, socks, mobile covers, balloons, tea, vada pav or miracle medicines guaranteed to cure everything except old age.
The footpath was... just a footpath.
What a waste.
In India we believe in making every square foot productive.
A footpath should not merely allow people to walk. It should support the economy.
By the time you leave home you should be able to buy bananas, recharge your phone, repair your slippers, eat breakfast, purchase two T-shirts, collect your courier and argue with a traffic policeman, all without leaving the footpath.
Provided, of course, you can find the footpath.
That is the real challenge.
In India, the pedestrian has become something of an unwanted guest. The footpath belongs to everybody except the fellow who wants to walk on it.
The shopkeeper has lovingly extended his showroom onto it. The vendor has established permanent residence. The motorcyclist has decided it is an excellent shortcut during traffic jams. Cars park on it because the road is full. Building material arrives and never seems to leave. Somewhere in between stands a lonely pedestrian wondering whether life insurance covers walking.
Of course, nobody asks how all this happens.
There is always that mysterious invisible arrangement everybody knows about but nobody talks about. A little weekly collection here, called the hafta, collected unofficially by the authorities. A little looking the other way there. The authorities pretend not to notice. The vendors pretend everything is legal. The pedestrian pretends he enjoys dodging buses.
Everybody is happy.
Except the pedestrian.
The strange thing is that India probably has far more people walking than America. Millions cannot afford cars. They walk to work, to school, to the railway station and to the market. Yet we treat those who walk as though they are second class citizens.
Then we proudly inaugurate another glittering skyscraper or a magnificent bridge.
Wonderful.
But can an eighty-year-old grandmother walk to the chemist without risking becoming tomorrow's headline?
Development does not begin with buildings that scrape the sky.
It begins with a footpath where a child can skip, an elderly man can stroll, a mother can push a pram and a disabled person can move with dignity.
A country's greatness is measured not by the height of its towers but by how safely its ordinary citizens can walk beneath them.
Until then, if someone asks me who owns the footpath in India, I have only one answer.
Certainly not the fellow on foot…!
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