Lalbagh flower show

Not early in the life I came to learn that I was acrophobic (fear of heights). It took sometime however to know I was afraid of crowds as well. With population of India touching 100 crores, this phobia might prove as one hell to me. This was the main reason I avoided crowded places like plague. But the annual flower show at Lalbagh was too tempting to resist. And of course, my recent love for photographing flowers overcome the phobia, to take me to it on the final day of the show on 15^th, the Independence Day.

By looking at the crawling traffic from over one kilo meter from the Lalbagh’s main gate, I imagined the rush. But, still wanted to give it a try. I maneuvered the car in to the park gate carefully thinking the worst is over. In the park, the car moved an inch or so every alternate minute. There were no policemen or volunteers that guided the drivers to the parking lots, though all of them were there, looking busy. Following couple of cars, we landed in what can be termed as Human Ocean. People were all over the place, all I can see people and nothing else. They were half surprised and half irritated watching me drive through them. I remembered movie The Mummy where the lead characters get in to such trouble albeit horrible than mine. After driving with break and clutch firmly pressed for over half an hour, I managed to see something other than people. I parked my car along side a road in the middle of the park, where some other vehicles accompanied mine.

The walk from there to the ‘glass house’ was even more adventurous. Most of the lawns were covered with the plastic covers, papers that people have left behind after having snacks. Very few dust bins available were overflowing. The scene around the glass house was just gotten worse. In a corner police, fire vehicles stood and police were watching at the crowd helpless. There was an unorganized queue that neither had boundaries nor a entry point. Before my phobia took the ugliest experience, I decided to walk back. Taking a shot of the glimpse of the Taj Mahal made with flowers from over 50 feet with my 3x zoom camera I was not in a mood to curse anybody for the decision to return.

This is a wonderful example of things going out of control. Yes, that best explains the situation. To me, this is no different than the riot like situation we all experienced when Dr. Raj Kumar passed away. Last time when I visited (two years ago, and on republic day flower show), things were different and the crowd was manageable. With media giving more publicity to these events, naturally the turn out will be more. Imagine two years ago we had only two main stream Kannada channels, today I see at least three more added. Two years can change a lot, and every year the management of the park should revise the plans to accommodate more people, seek more police, incorporate stringent crowd managing rules.