Chennai has been one of the four traditional metropolises of India. However, today, thanks to the IT boom, this city is fast facing competition from other southern cities. Chennai needs to use its natural advantages to its benefit.

A case in point is that of the Kathipara clover-leaf grade separator right at the entrance to the city where three of the city’s most important roads converge. This project was to be completed by April 2007. Today, almost one year after the deadline, the project is far from over. There are still many unfinished and unconnected limbs. Crossing the construction area is a nightmare, especially during the peak hours, given the huge pile-up of vehicles. For regular commuters, it is nothing new. But, a visitor to the city by air being greeted by a pile-up of vehicles even before he enters the city is not something we should be proud about.  I wonder why this state of affairs when the Union Highways Minister is from our city. It is most ironical that the grade separator is being constructed on a National Highway.

The traffic there somehow legitimizes the ‘mela potu kodu’ of the auto-drivers. I reluctantly agree to give ten or twenty more so that he would concentrate on driving rather than mutter curses and stare at me in the rear-view mirror.

We also have from our state the Union Minister of State for Railways. But, the plight of the new MRTS is hardly an indication of this fact. The MRTS falls under Southern Railway and has great potential to mitigate the transport problems of the city, especially since it traverses along the IT corridor. But, poorly-lit, poorly-maintained and unapproachable stations have prevented MRTS from harnessing its potential. The lower floor of stations is empty and used by vagrants and slum-dwellers. Instead, it could be put to commercial use and generate revenue. The MRTS from Beach to Velachery took almost three decades to finish. Now, one can only hope that the Velachery – St. Thomas Mount Section is completed on time. This will provide good connectivity to the oft-neglected southern suburbs of the city.

In any city, suburbs are the lifeline of the city. However, the southern suburbs of Chennai have always been given a raw deal. Part of the Kanchipuram District, the southern suburbs are administered by numerous Municipalities, Town Panchayats and Village Panchayats leading to implementation problems. Once, I was surprised to see the road-laying work being stopped just before my grandmother’s house in suburban Chennai. The road in front of the neighboring house was black-topped whereas the portion in front of our house was not laid. When I asked her why the workers left it incomplete, I was told that while our house fell under a Town Panchayat, the neighboring house fell under a Municipality. Similarly, numerous development works, including one involving a flyover over the railway track near Guindy have been hindered because of clash of authorities and Collectorates. Many times it reduces to a simple game of ‘who will bell the cat’ with authorities deflecting the responsibility on one-another.

The administration has been unable to keep up with the pace of development in these regions. While the areas are very much city-like in their appearance with multi-storied flats, numerous banks, ATMs and supermarkets, they are still governed by small panchayats making implementation of policies difficult. When the Chennai Corporation can handle the vast area of the city efficiently, it makes no sense to segregate suburbs into bits and pieces as municipalities and panchayats. We should have a Corporation of Greater Chennai as well.