MTNL and other mores for Mumbai

I have to admit — dealing with MTNL is much more pleasant than it used to be. Complaints are attended to in days rather than weeks, officials are more polite, the range of services on offer don’t always work (find me someone with a call waiting that functions perfectly) but you can fax the Customer Services Cell instead of wasting half a day in queues and they actually pay attention. Last week I went to my local MTNL office to pay a pending bill. The whole thing — getting a duplicate bill, figuring out whether it had to be paid by cash or cheque and paying it — took just a few minutes. It was, I would have said, a remarkably painless experience. Except: nowhere around the entrance was there any indication of where one had to go.

In the space between the gate and the counters — which turned out to be close by and conveniently located in the compound — was an ad hoc parking lot and a mound of sand for some construction work that was going on somewhere out of sight. The table placed for use by payees — to write out cheques or make written alterations was encrusted with dirt. These may seem like small things but they are indicative of a major hangover from the past. It would take so very little — some signage, a couple of pots, freeing the route the customers take from encumbrance, a little cleanliness — to make a difference. Dare we hope?

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In its December 1999 issue the glossy international quarterly The Wallpaper concentrated on urban design and picked the best 100 elements for the turn of the century from all over the world. They included:

Inner City Renewal:
The remarkable transformation of the El Chino area of Barcelona. Earmarked for a post-Olympics overhaul, El Chino used to be a dirty, dank red light area — Jean Genet apparently wrote A Thieves’ Journal in one of its whorehouses. Now apartment blocks have been torn down to make way for circuitous plazas. The completion of Richard Meier’s gleaming Museum of Modern Art in 1995 has led to a surge of new bars and restaurants. An interesting mix of the modern and the seedy.

Urban Design:
Good urban design is a rarefied art. In this post-modern era there are only a small coterie of architects who meld elegant modernism with the development of traditional urban forms. Notable among these is Neutelings Riedijk in the Netherlands (formed by Wllem Neutelings and Michiel Riedijk in 1987). An example of its work is the Hollainhof social development housing scheme in Belgium. Abstract compositions of interlocking flats are unified by their silvery cedar skins (sketches recall Le Corbusier’s vignettes of the Cite Radieuse). In Hollainhof the courtyard dominates planted with plane trees designed to enhance quality of life and the feeling of space. Locally known as luxury social housing, it is a model development for inner city areas.

Do-It-Yourself:
An advertisement in the magazine claims to change the way property is created by involving the customer in the design process. ‘‘Kitchens, bathrooms, wood and stone floors all chosen by you... a home which is truly an expression of yourself.’’ Cost starts at Pounds 180,000. Interested? Check out www.metropolis1.com

Rickshaws:
From spring 2000 BMW will be selling a hybrid of a motorcycle and a car. The vehicle will have a laminated glass windscreen, all round safety cage, a scooter-like base powered by a 125 cc engine and speeds up to 60 mph. There will be three models — a basic one to function like a hire car at airports and train stations; a ‘family friend’ model to act as a secondary runabout, and an ‘executive model’ boasting graphite metallic paint and a range of options. Costing between 4000 and 5000 pounds these superscooters are slated to be the latest in urban transport. Old wine in a shiny new bottle?

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