Opinion | Gurugram And Its 'Manhattan' Dreams: Fake It Till You Flood It

There is a reason why Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro, made in 1983, is called a cult movie. There is plenty in the Kundan Shah satire to jolt one's memory every time something strange or absurd happens in India. As it happens, this week I thought of Tarneja, the ruthless real estate builder played by Pankaj Kapur, as monsoon rains flooded Gurugram, sparking an annual ritual of outrage, memes and protests.

In that movie, there is a place where the then Bombay's realtor talks of plans to reclaim the Arabian Sea, with the projection that one day, Bombay will reach Dubai. In Gurugram's case, one could say that having reached Sohna and Bhiwadi already, the city, once considered a distant, rural suburb of "congested" Delhi, is fast on its way to a merger with Jaipur. While news pages are moaning about waterlogged roads in the city, there is a builder boldly advertising in a newspaper jacket "luxe suites" in a place imaginatively titled "South of Gurugram".

It seems like the other day that a locality now in the heart of New Delhi was named "South Extension" in a self-explanatory name gone horribly wrong.

A Reality Check, Please

Gurugram's realty boom badly needs a reality check. A drive through the national highway to Jaipur on a sunny winter day might well make you think you are driving past an Asian version of New York's Manhattan, befitting its title as Millennium City, as skyscrapers with multinational software company tags flash by. But the ground reality is exposed in the rainy season, when you realise cloud computing badly needs a monsoon version because there is no connection between the Manhattan fantasies and traffic jams worsened by flooded roads, not to speak of accidents caused by exposed live wires.

A massive crater swallowed by a truck in Gurugram late Wednesday night after an intense spell of rain caused a portion of the road to collapse.

A friend updates on Facebook that he is now staying in what might be called Lake View Apartments. Given the mix of unfounded optimism and brash advertising that Gurugram's realtors are famous for, they might even turn such sarcasm into a sales pitch. "We promised you a Manhattan Skyline. We also deliver Venice. Absolutely free. Rush to book at early bird prices."

Seriously, how did we get here? Gurugram is growing on all sides, defying all sorts of logic. The answers are varied, but the phenomenon remains real.

From Gaon To Gurgaon

Circa 1991, when India launched an economic liberalisation programme under then Finance Minister Manmohan Singh, the doors were opened to prospects of foreign investment, and with it came a dream sold by Kushal Pal Singh, who built DLF and acquired the tag of the builder of Millennium City. Until then, Gurgaon, as it was called, was an affordable boondocks village for poorer Delhiwalas, such as humbler Partition refugees from Punjab. Then there were early Punjabi lovers of the "kothi" (a house built on one's own plot, not a multistorey apartment) who dreamed of an idyllic life away from what was then called "polluted" Delhi. Today, Gurugram grapples not only with monsoon flooding but also winter-time smog equally blessed by an unchecked automobile boom and stubble-burning by farmers in Haryana and Punjab.

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DLF successfully sold new dreams as companies like Nestle built spacious Manhattan-resembling offices. South Delhi's eager wannabes bought into the dream and shifted up in droves as well-paying MNC jobs met New York and new-rich lifestyle fantasies. As the Microsofts and Googles of this world set up shop, the centre of gravity of India's national capital almost shifted to the concrete-and-glass skyscrapers of Gurugram. A new-age metro rail moved in to aid poorer commuters. Such is the lifestyle-meets-social status dream of the South Delhi middle-class that monsoon mayhem and large doses of pollution do little to shake their zest for life.

Gated Dreams Meet Guttered Roads

Around the same time as Gurugram started towards its skyscrapers, in 1991, Robert Reich, who went on to become the Secretary of Labor for the US, wrote in a thought-leading New York Times article titled 'Secession of the Successful' about the rise of gated communities for the rich. Gurgaon-turned-Gurugram offers an excellent Indian example of the phenomenon that undermines old-fashioned ideas of the city as a shared space of various kinds of citizenry.

But fairy tales have a horrible way of unravelling. Waterlogging, traffic jams, bar brawls, and air pollution are part of Gurugram's everyday reality because heady growth was foisted upon the city by a bunch of realtors and wannabe consumers who had the wealth to buy penthouses, but not the resourcefulness to build basic infrastructure. The greatness of urbanity was thrust upon what was once a sleepy village, resulting in a strange mix of vanity and inanity.

A Shoddy System

It pays to remember that Gurugram started out with a difficult terrain. It is partly located around the rocky Aravalli hills. Groundwater problems and water shortages were somewhat anticipated. But the overloading of offices and apartments and the inadequacy of municipal infrastructure were not really on the minds of dream merchants.

A flooded road in Gurugram last year.

Gurugram did not have a municipal corporation until 2008, nearly two decades after the suburb started out to be a city. The city had a master plan unveiled only in 2007, while a "metropolitan development authority" was set up as late as 2017. Such bodies, pushed more by private developers than a real town-planning vision, had mixed-up priorities, much like a house having ambitious architects but not a sound foundation.

What Could Have Been

You only have to contrast Gurugram with Noida, Chandigarh or New Delhi to get an idea of what could have been. Built by state authorities who thought up roads, parks and stadia first, the sense of space and infrastructure management shown by these cities is far better than Gurugram.

It does not help that the rich, trendy citizens of Gurugram have no real voting power. Even New York has a 'leftist' in Zohran Mamdani to speak for the well-being of its citizens. The Haryana town has no such luck. Farmers-turned-land sellers or rugged rural politicians offer little hope for its lifestyle addicts, who are more comfortable in happening bars than in mustard fields.

When the successful secede from their roots, they learn hard lessons in politics and administration. Angry Instagram posts or tagging politicos on X tweets can hardly help. Their high-rise apartment block is more like a Noah's Ark protecting them from the floods than a tower of power that can get roads cleaned up. Realtors, meanwhile, sell more dreams to feather their own nests.

Maybe, just maybe, dreams of a Viksit Bharat may grow to include the idea that development is not about Gross Domestic Product but the quality of life of citizens. Maybe, just maybe, such moral suasion might work on rugged politicians who are busy dividing people along caste or religious lines. Maybe, just maybe, we might see a born-again Gurugram in which the facilities inside a gated complex match the amenities outside.

Hope thrashes about in the swirling, muddy monsoon waters of Millennium City.

(Madhavan Narayanan is a senior editor, writer and columnist with more than 30 years of experience, having worked for Reuters, The Economic Times, Business Standard, and Hindustan Times after starting out in the Times of India Group.)

Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author