We all
indulge in little dress up or try to put up a show, when someone
important is likely to visit our homes or work places. If we invite
people home for a party or a get together, arranging things in the
house so they look neat and clean or changing those soiled curtains
on windows is something we usually do. The same holds good even in
our workplaces.
I used
to work in a large industry involved in vehicle manufacture. Whenever
top bosses used to visit our plant, it was a common practice to give
a new coat of paint to walls and machinery so they looked nice. In a
way, it was a good arrangement, because once or twice in a year,
everything would get cleaned up. In a similar fashion, if a top
leader is going to visit my hometown, Pune, the city authorities
always carry out a little deck up effort, like repairing the roads
and the footpaths. In the year 2008 when Commonwealth Youth Games
were held in the city, we were pleasantly surprised to find many
potted plants with flowers in full bloom placed on road sides and
road dividers. Needless to say that after the games were over, all
the potted plants had also disappeared to.
I
recently came across a story
of some ultimate deck up efforts
by one city authorities in China and want to share it with readers.
It was during month of August last year (2012) that authorities of
Canton township, Nanyang city, Henan province of China, decided to
plant about 1000 seedlings on the sides of Avenue GuangYang to
beautify and upgrade it and impress the leaders, who would be
visiting the city, during yearly autumn festival held in that place.
A local firm, Henan Green Banglin Co. came to know about the decision
and decided to take the initiative. They made an offer to the local
Government to undertake and execute the complete project, and
provide technical guidance and also offered to provide seedlings of
381 Camphor trees, free of cost.
Local
Government accepted the offer and by festival time, rows of camphor
trees were seen standing by every one. Subsequently, the trees lost
all the leaves as usually happens every winter. However no green buds
appeared during spring and even by month of May 2013, no new leaves
were seen growing on any of the tress. Then mysteriously, all tress
were dug out and carried off in trucks. While this work was going on,
local villagers observed that the trees being taken out had no roots
at all. Obviously, they were just tree branches cut off from a tree.
A
local reporter decided to investigate the matter and asked a deputy
secretary, why the trees have no roots. The deputy secretary gave
evasive answers like; it should be checked and finally brushed off
the reporter saying: “I'm not responsible for planting trees.”
The reporter then contacted the Henan Green Banglin Co; where a
responsible person with a surname Su explained that the trees are
dead in large number because the weather is too cold and trees were
not properly looked after. Besides that, no roots were seen because
they were probably cut off during uprooting operation.
Readers
can draw their own conclusions regarding, what must have happened?
There is no need for me to elaborate. The city government now has
posted on its web site the same reasons, as those given by Henan
Green Banglin Co and says that the Government is replanting new
trees, which would be looked after carefully to improve survival rate
of trees.
This
report also mentions another fantastic effort on part of authorities
to dress up things, before a senior party official was due to visit.
A river known as Li river flows in the city. The waters of this river
are extremely polluted. In April of this year (2013), just before a
visit by some senior leader, Henan Luohe City made an emergency
purchase of 5,000,000 cubic meters of clean water from upstream
Yanshan Reservoir and asked them to release it into the river. River
water became absolutely clear, overnight and at the time of the visit
of the senior leader, when he inspected the river, he found no traces
of any pollution as was complained by some people to him. Just to
make the show more effective, some junior civil servants were posing
as ordinary people and who praised the local Government for its
efficiency and effectiveness to senior leaders.
Can
any one beat or surpass this effort?
8th
June 2013
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