|
Travelogues Chandigarh: Planned Harmony
|
|||||||||||||||
Right across the city from north to south, runs a seasonal stream, the banks of which have been landscaped to provide a continuous stretch of green.
|
More on Chandigarh • An Overview
Travelogues
Impressions
Package Holidays | ||||||||||||||
Rapidly moving along the technological highway, with it's developing corporate sector, internet services arrived early here, along with the setting up of a software technology park, and the promotion of non polluting industries. Strict enforcement of traffic regulations and a high degree of awareness of the literate population of the city, ensures minimum pollution levels. The landscaped roundabouts connecting the major dividing roads are ablaze with flowers. In the extreme winters the flowers are interspersed with city dwellers basking in the warm sun.
Chandigarh has it's share of population hazards. Though the city is expanding peripherally into the satellite towns of Panchkula and Mohali, in Haryana and Punjab respectively, yet congestion stress is clearly visible during office hour rush.
|
|||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||
Editor: Romola Butalia (c) India Travelogue. All rights reserved. |
|||||||||||||||
There is a certain planned harmony about the city, which I have not seen elsewhere in India. The city is divided into sectors with the sum of adjacent sectors being exactly divisible by 13, there being no sector 13. The city projects the aesthetics of planned space that enhances quality of living and well-being.
Chandigarh has an organised network of well-maintained, wide, metalled roads, kept clean and litter-free, moving on course to becoming a world Heritage city by 2020 A. D. Even during the monsoons, potholes are a rare sight. The sanitation of the city reflects the planning and foresight of the architect.
Chandigarh is the backdrop of my growing years. I have heard birds tweet and chatter, chirp and serenade. I have seen flowers bloom in a profusion of colour. Chandigarh defines for me the nostalgia of living: the laughter and play of childhood, the growing pangs of adolescence, the existential angst of early adulthood, and the sense of fulfilment from a life that's leading somewhere, wherever that may be. And in the evening lull, there is both peace and turbulence like the waves in the ocean in constant motion, yet totally static. The orange glow of the setting sun over Chandigarh has the power to absorb me totally.