Srinagar, we were repeatedly told, has been transformed into a “smart city.” Ironically, it was never as congested, chaotic, or directionless as it became after that declaration. If “smartness” is measured by how many minutes it takes a common citizen to crawl through a two-kilometre patch of road, then yes, we have indeed made unprecedented progress. The city that once breathed in long, uninterrupted corridors – from Dalgate to Batamaloo, from Karan Nagar to Khanyar – now gasps for space like an asthmatic trapped in a smoke chamber.
Let us begin with the most generous assumption: that governance is driven by intention. But even under that generous assumption, Srinagar’s current suffocation cannot be excused as accidental. It is the direct consequence of overthinking, overprocessing, and the administration’s peculiar obsession with committees – those magical rooms where decisions go to sleep and problems grow up.
And here is the sarcastic truth: Was Srinagar ever this suffocated before it became “smart”? The old, organically functioning city – with its imperfect roads and imperfect planning – still had movement, rhythm, flow. Today, even a short stretch of road looks like a stalled conveyor belt. The city chokes not because traffic suddenly multiplied but because common sense quietly vanished from those entrusted to govern it.
Is It Really That Hard?
Here is a question worth placing on the table of every meeting room where planners sit polishing PowerPoint slides: Does it really take a Divisional Commissioner, a Deputy Commissioner, or a Municipal Commissioner more than a week to think of basic decongestion measures?
Even if we grant them seven days for “brainstorming,” can’t they begin execution the week after? Does it truly require committees, sub-committees, working groups, “expert consultations,” and “site assessments” to understand that clearing encroachments, regulating parking, and restoring footpaths require common sense more than rocket science?
This is the Bitter Truth: Srinagar’s governance has replaced action with committees. Every simple decision is handed over to a panel, which passes it to a sub-panel, which circulates it across departments. By the time feedback is collected, the problem has become bigger than the committee meant to solve it.
The Traffic Is Not the Problem. Everything Else Is
Let us state it without diplomatic cushioning: It is not the traffic that has congested Srinagar. It is the criminal neglect around it.
The city is choking because:
- Squatters Have Occupied Both Sides of Nearly Every Road
From Hawal to Habba Kadal, from Batamaloo to Qamarwari, from Karan Nagar to Lal Chowk – every available inch has been surrendered to vendors, makeshift stalls, or semi-permanent structures.
- Bus Stops Built Right on the Necks of Roads
Instead of bays pulled off the carriageway, we have bus halts placed in the middle of critical curves. One stoppage triggers one kilometre of gridlock.
- Haphazard Parking at No-Parking Zones
Violators know enforcement is a myth, so they park exactly where the signboard forbids it. When the cost of violation is zero, chaos becomes rational behaviour.
- Shopkeepers Have Colonised Footpaths
Footpaths have become private shop extensions. Pedestrians are forced onto the road, adding yet another layer to the congestion cycle.
- Widespread Corruption in the Srinagar Municipal Corporation
Encroachments do not exist without a chain of indulgent hands. Illegal structures do not thrive unless silence is purchased or negotiated. Srinagar’s roads have become a living museum of tolerated illegality. If commissioner’s office needs to be spic and span, why should citizens get a raw deal?
- Dammit, Use Bulldozers Here – Where They Are a Necessity
Here is the part that will make some uncomfortable: If the administration clears encroachments on Srinagar roads in a single, no-nonsense, 48-hour drive, half of the congestion will vanish instantly.
This would be the correct, justified, lawful use of bulldozers – to restore public right-of-way, not as a tool of political symbolism. Roads do not belong to shopkeepers, squatters, or encroachers. They belong to the public.
Delhi does it. Jaipur does it. Surat does it. Chandigarh does it routinely. Why is Srinagar allergic to action? Or it simply has such parched hands that need periodic greasing.
Before someone cries about livelihoods, another question must be asked: What about the livelihoods, fuel, time, mental health, and productivity of lakhs of commuters punished every single day? Governance cannot protect the illegal at the cost of the lawful.
Or yet another question must be asked: Why don’t you give them designated spaces to shout and sell?
One Week of Planning, One Week of Execution – That’s All
Let the administration prove us wrong. Give them one week to plan and one week to act.
Srinagar can breathe again in 14 days without spending a fortune:
- Remove roadside squatters
- Realign bus stops
- Penalise illegal parking
- Recover footpaths
- Enforce lane discipline
- Streamline vendor zones
- End administrative indulgence
- Seek weekly reports from the municipal commissioner
And now comes the missing piece – the one no one wants to talk about.
- Move Away from This Nonsense Called “Sunday Markets” Everywhere
It is time to say it plainly: Srinagar must move away from this absurd practice of allowing Sunday markets to pop up anywhere and everywhere. If the city has designated markets, then let the vendors operate there. Roads are not meant to become open-air flea bazaars selling second-hand Bangladeshi apparel, worn-out winter boots, and insane factory rejects.
Even on Sundays – when traffic is comparatively less – roads are still for vehicles, not for howlers pushing heaps of cheap, disposable merchandise. And disposable it indeed is. By buying dirt-cheap garments and junk items, people are only clogging their homes with clutter they will throw out next season.
And when they throw it out, guess who receives this avalanche of junk with open arms? The Srinagar Municipal Corporation, which then happily watches the litter pile up everywhere – on pavements, canals, drains, and roadsides.
Does anyone in the corporation feel troubled? Do they worry about aesthetics, hygiene, or public decency?
Do they feel the slightest shame when Srinagar’s streets turn into dumping yards? Clearly not.
If the Municipal Commissioner kept Srinagar even half as clean as he keeps his office, this city would be unrecognisable.
The Sunday market syndrome must end. Not because people should be deprived of affordability, but because the city cannot be held hostage to unregulated chaos disguised as economic activity.
If designated vendor zones do not exist, create them. Let all such markets shift there. But let Srinagar’s arterial roads remain what they were meant to be: roads, not carnival grounds for low-grade merchandise.
The Final Bitter Truth
Cities do not collapse because of lack of ideas. They collapse because of lack of courage. Or the blot of corruption. Srinagar today is not a victim of traffic – it is a victim of timidity. Of shamelessness. The administration knows exactly what must be done. The public knows exactly what is going wrong. Only the will to act is missing.
