A muggy post-rains evening, you are making your way through traffic. The muggy weather, the conditions of the roads and metro work has screwed up the traffic have got you all flustered.
So you zig-zag pass countless vehicles, as two-wheeler can only do, to move ahead. All of a sudden your path is blocked by a lady walking slowly. Clearly she's jay walking, so you gently honk your horn trying to get her to give you way. She turns and gives you the look as if you have committed a cardinal sin and are totally wrong. You try in vain to get her to move and helplessly listen to her lecture. Your hapless self try to explain that you are on the road and she is in the wrong by jay walking on the road. You try to indicate that there's a place for her to walk. But then you notice that's something is amiss, something is not there. And low and behold its the pavements that's missing.
So like an unsolved mystery you wonder, where have all the pavements gone? And then you have Paula Cole's Where have all the Cowboys gone, buzzing in your head, followed by Adele's Chasing Pavement.
Surely this is a mystery that needs to be solved. Where's Sherlock when you need him? Even ACP Pradhyuman or Daya or Fredrick would do. So you have the mystery of the missing pavement on your hand, life is now going to get interesting.
As you dwell deeper into the mire you realise that the pavements haven't gone anywhere, just we humans have gone everywhere. The poor pavements have become more multipurpose than they were intended for.
So where you had walkers treading on them, you find open manholes and broken tiles. They have now become the dwelling place and outdoor relieving place for those who can't afford a place. At many places they become a workshops and bike repair, at some places they seem to have become a garbage disposal place and quite a few area, the road widening has lead to pavement shrinking.
In such a situation poor walkers have gone from ordinary to jay walkers, often risking life and limb, often in frustration as they clash with traffic trying to make heir way through the crowded roads.
So there you have it, the mystery of missing pavement is solved, laid bare for all to see. Now the question is what needs to be done to get them back. Something you and I would not know what to do... or so I assume...
