Powerless City grinds to a halt

If you find a typo in the story, blame on the power outage that the Capital along with many other states has been facing for the past two days. Sitting in offices or travelling by the Metro; riding in luxury cars or going to places by DTC buses, nobody remained untouched.

The skies too opened up belatedly, bri­n­ging as much relief as chaos.
Delhi Metro came to a gri­n­ding halt for over half an hour, the traffic signals stopped working and the City resembled a carnival with hordes on ro­a­ds (waiting for buses that took ages to arrive but left without taking fresh passengers because they were
already over­lo­aded). Vehicles queues stretched as far as ‘eye’ could see.


While the situation ‘normalised’ somewhat to­w­ards the evening, the mess left everyone in the City talking about it. Metrolife  caught up with some harried souls to get their reactions on the Capital mess.

With no means to move anywhere, women worried about children not coming back on time while youngsters chill­ed out irrespective of whe­r­ever they were stuck.

The elderly resorted to blaming the nikkami gove­r­nment and there were others who agreed. “I bet the politicians’ ACs are working. They have backup for themselves but what does the common man do? We pay taxes. Now we know where they end up,” said Raghav Chaudhary, a student.

Many were disappointed that their ‘dear Metro’ was as stranded as them. Amit Verma, a law student said, “I never expe­c­ted the Metro to stop wo­r­k­ing, but yes, now I will keep it in mind for future.”

Some students, otherwise used to the Metro, waiting for a bus was a novel experience though they agreed that alternatives needed to be seriously considered. Anjali Minj, a Std XII student, sha­red, “If something as serious as this happens again, maybe we will have to think about alternative options - like harnessing solar energy.”

Autowallahs as usual lived up to their reputation of making life difficult. Here was an opportunity they were not going to pass up. So they charged double-triple of the usual rates. “I had to take an auto from Noida to CP, and I was asked to pay Rs 300 (on sharing basis ) and 500 if I was alone,” shared Tanu Mukherjee, a professional who ultimately waited for a bus to arrive.

Maybe next time, the Northern Grid decides to trip, somebody out there will take the trouble to forewarn the country!