It used to be almost romantic. A soft rolling mist that reminded us of Himalayan mornings. To weather-hardened Delhi people, pollution is just one more thing that newspapers mention. Never really featuring in our own Maslow need hierarchy. Food, security, survival in the demonic summer and cruel winter are enough to consume our energy. Then there are traffic jams, housing problems, home loan repayment stress, and every kind of stress that oozes out so abundantly from Indian urban living.
Every Westerner I meet, and indeed even people from other cities, ask me how the Delhiite is so numb to this ‘life in a gas chamber’. But we are! It’s kind of a non-priority. In our minds a first world problem. Even for the rich, planning details of dressing at each one of the eleven wedding functions is of infinitely higher importance.
So here we are after decades of friendly coexistence with the phenomenon of air pollution. Visually it’s no longer the gentle mist, it is as thick as the good Dahi (yogurt) used in the good Delhi homes. It no longer rolls around in the distance, it attacks you as soon as you step out and attaches itself like an aura of gelatinous blubber as you walk indoors.
Long gone are the days of light hearted “hey, living in Delhi is like smoking 35 cigarettes a day” type of jokes. Exposure to this level of air pollution now means a high chance of stroke, lung cancer, breast cancer, heart disease, neurological, and ENT diseases. And let’s not talk about what it does to the young children and elderly. In fact we have stopped talking about it completely. Subconsciously hoping that if we lift our attention from it, it will affect us less.
Two days ago, after I heard that we had had a morning of over a 1000 AQI, I was talking to an acquaintance and I expressed my concern at the urgency of the situation. I could sense her discomfort as she tried to hear me out. This is hardly a fun conversation for us.
At the end of it she said to me “you know Anupamaa, the problem is not the pollution, but where you live. You live in a farmhouse in the middle of a jungle, far from the city, you should be living in one of the posh neighbourhoods in Delhi.”
Anupamaa Dayal
This fashion designer is about happy clothes and happy homes for happy women
