 Hi, welcome to this another episode of NewsClick where we are doing a series on the central Vista. And as we had pointed out in our last episode that the central Vista issue has popped up once again. And it is very pertinent to mention that when the entire country is grappling with the pandemic and when the resources must and ought to be diverted to mitigate the disaster that we are actually facing because of the pandemic, our supreme leader and the government actually focuses on the construction of the central Vista. And as we mentioned, it comprises the house of the prime minister, new parliament building and many more buildings to come. And at the same time, when the workers should have actually gone back either to their homes or should have been protected, the same workers are being forced to work in the pandemic. So in continuation of that series, today we have Shana Zatalia who would be discussing what is wrong with the entire central Vista with the process or the way the central Vista has been designed. And above all, let me also introduce that Shana's was and she is still a film producer who's worked in many films, especially films that were produced by Mead Anayar. So we are very glad to have Shana's here and she loves to be called as Shani. So Shani, are you there? Can we just start the discussion? Yes, I'm here. Oh, great. So Shani, and I remember in the conversation about it actually, I mean, this is something that pinches your heart because you who being a deliite, I mean, you say you're a, I mean, from the core of the heart you're a deli woman. And so what is it? What is it that you feel is not good with this internal Vista or this entire project? Though the government boasts and claims of many things that are going to change once the project is done. See, I think that various people who you've spoken to have given you facts and figures and numbers. So I'm not going to go into that. I think what I want to go into is what, and I would like, as Mukul Keswan had written in his article in the telegraph, to say that I'm talking about India Gate. Okay. I am not talking about its new avatar, which is the central Vista. I mean, you know, you refer to the central Vista when you're talking about any capital city, whether it be London, whether it be Washington, whether it be Canberra, whether it be India, blah, blah, blah, so on and so forth. So for me, the central Vista, when you mentioned something like central Vista, it basically means a parliament, government offices, and a broad avenue. Now, to me, in Delhi, the central Vista doesn't hold that meaning. India Gate, for me, is what central Vista is. Okay, okay. Right, so, A, I'm very born and bred. Anybody who was born in Delhi in the 50s and the 60s learnt cycling at India Gate. There was no one. You must stay broad. And if you learnt how to keep your balance, your father or your brother would take you on top of rice in a hill and push you down. And hope that you managed on that slope to keep cycling. It's where you had your first ice cream. It's where you had chana. It's where, oh, come on, this is a new thing. It's like that. It's part of my growing up. Okay, so how would that be ficted? I mean, tell me. Because I don't feel that there's any change required. Okay. What do you want to do? Yeah. There's a road, there are government offices. The parliament building exists and for heaven's sake, from when it was constructed to now, we haven't increased the numbers of people in parliament, have we? I mean, we haven't doubled it to 10,000 people that we need another ginormous parliament building. Everybody has their chambers. As a teenager growing up, I've gone and sat in parliament. Right at that time, in the early 70s, you could go. You could, layman could go sit in parliament, watch a debate, nobody didn't have million and want whatever security that you had. But above all, what Indiagate and, let me use the word central vista since it's what you all use at the moment, means for me is the street dogs who live there. Okay. Right? We feed animals from Connaught Place to Jampath to Indiagate. There are about four of us who combine together, take various sections and do this. And we specifically look after the area which is at the intersection of Rajpath and Jampath. Now again, Rajpath, I don't even know whether it's gonna have that meaning. Jampath used to be called Queensway. Yeah, Queensway. The name is changed to Jampath. Yeah. Rajpath was Kingsway, it's still Rajpath. So that hasn't changed. Now there are lots of, now as you know, Debbie has a lot of street dogs. What we have been trying to do and have succeeded, especially in this area, is to sterilize all the animals as much as we can. So that no more puppies come and so the population of street dogs is controlled. They are inoculated. When they are well fed, they're not gonna chase people. And really, you will not find any dog at Indiagate chasing traffic ever. And that's why even on Republic Day, previously, this habit of taking dogs and putting them away for one month while they do their rehearsals is really quite idiotic because they don't bother with the people on Rajpath. They sit in the, what they needed to do was to clean it, was to make sure that the grass is always green, was to make sure that the channels are full of water and clean water. Not filthy water. You don't need to build up your wings. I mean, and the other very critical thing is when they talk about the fact, now who do you want to nuclear bunker for, may I ask? It'll be eating in the summer camp. It's just like- It's like it's just like- It's just like- It's just like- It's just like- It's just like- It's just like- It's just like- It's just like- It's just like- It's just like- It's just like- money when people are dying and I have friends who are in hospitals, I have friends who are in the ICU who are on ventilators and I mean what words can I use? I can have appeal, please don't waste money on whether it's not required. What is beautiful? Leave it. Use that money, inoculate people, give oxygen, this is a capital city, we've become a laughing stock internationally. Yeah, Shahnaz I remember actually one of our discussions pointing it out earlier in a discussion that you may have the same kind of open spaces still available, but at the same time, you find a sniper pointing a gun at you with all these buildings coming up, so don't you think that was the kind of encroachment on the privacy of the people and all? It is, I mean any gate is where the armed army went, not everybody is a member of Jim Khanna club, not everybody is a member of the IIC, so where do you go? Not everybody lives in colonies that have parks. In your gate is our space, it is the general humanity's space. Yeah, yeah and but because during a discussion and in one of the previous discussions we learned that you mentioned about dogs but I mean if you see the trees around, so I think we were able to calculate maybe a hundred different species of birds in fact who come and yeah, so it's not this, I mean animals on the ground but even on the trees. On the trees and also don't forget the jamons, right and also now palsa is not a fruit that many people know about, it's a specific north Indian summer fruit which comes for a month. Right, so eating jamon, eating palsa, you know all that was part of India's gate. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so yeah, yeah, please, please, please go ahead, go ahead. Sorry, all I was saying was that you don't need, you don't need red sandstone to walk on, you don't need pathways. Yeah, you don't. The hands are beautiful red sand, true, part of you know, yeah, yeah, yeah and please let's not forget those absolutely gorgeous lampposts. Yeah, let me tell you that chain which they are happily taking out, the black heavy rota and chain. Yeah, you have no idea about the value of that. You know, it's just panty and it'll never rust nor will the lampposts. You know these are things that people don't know about, they're just throwing it away. It's in a sense what happened partly in Connaught Place, when they wanted to remove the railings on the balcony, that is also rota. And I lived there and believe me, I did like a Chipco movement on my balcony saying over my dead body will you remove this. And I'm glad I did, because all the ones who allowed that balcony rota and need to be removed, it became rust. Yeah, I think you brought an important aspect because you know, most of the people are talking about, you know, the design, non-transparency in the central Vista, air pollution, you know, and all already Delhi's air is choking. I mean, it's really affecting the lungs of people and especially the young ones and with this new Vista, I think it's going to further accentuate the problem. But yeah, the new aspect about dogs, about animals, you know, for all they are also part and parcel of this planet, aren't they? So, but what do you think is now required? Because you have a Supreme Court dictum, they've said, no, we justify it. It's a judicially decided central Vista that has to go ahead. But at the same time, there are many voices coming from different corners, I mean, which we, I mean, which we never heard in earlier discussions. So what do you think should be done to amplify these voices to kind of, you know, bring together many such people so that, you know, we make the government, listen, I mean, even if it's deaf. Yes, we have to keep tripping away. And that means more civilian voices and certainly not channels like yours. And we also very, very definitely need to get this out in the vernacular, not only English, because frankly, it's the languages that reach out. And they have to, you know, they have to see what a colossal waste of money this is. Right, you can't build a palace and let people die. You know, you can't build the Nals and choke rivers with dead bodies. Yeah, true. And this is what we've written, I mean, gory stories, tales, I mean, how, and not one river, I mean, the many rivers that are missing dead bodies now. Dams, dead bodies, dead animals. I mean, you know, what are you building? You're building a palace of death. There's no need for that. No need. Shani, thank you for sparing your time and talking to us. And it's been really nice talking to you. And especially when you brought out the new aspect of Central Vista. Hey, dogs also listen. They also have a heart. They also feel so do birds, you know. And I mean, and even for human beings, I think, I think it's always a better place to be, you know, in an environment that is, I mean, that we have been witnessing now instead to have a sniper pointing a gun at you and then eating your popcorns and ice creams there. I think that's yeah. Yeah. So thank you so much, Shani. Thank you very much.