4 days ago
Rajasthan's stalled projects
When the Supreme Court, in March this year, ordered the demolition of kitschy replicas of the 'Seven Wonders' built along the banks of Ajmer's 12th-century Ana Sagar Lake—a protected wetland—it wasn't judicial activism so much as a belated course correction for a folly committed two years ago. Around the same time, Rajasthan chief minister Bhajan Lal Sharma ordered the dismantling of Jaipur's 16-km-long Bus Rapid Transit System (BRTS), a corridor completed 15 years ago but never brought into use. Blamed for traffic chaos and fatal accidents, the BRTS had become emblematic of the state's flawed urban planning.