Mumbai is a crowded city.
We crowd into trains, buses, lifts, markets, offices, restaurants and occasionally into spaces where even oxygen has to stand sideways.
Our housing societies are no different. Cars compete for parking, children compete for playing space, and neighbours compete to prove that the other neighbour’s flowerpot has crossed the boundary line by two inches.
But when Ganpati arrives in someone’s home, something changes.
A little space is made.
The neighbour who complains that your doormat is too large now steps aside respectfully. The gentleman who has fought with you over a parking spot arrives with sweets. The Christian family upstairs plays their music softer. The Muslim family next door smiles as the idol is carried in. Children of every faith gather around, not to debate theology, but to find out when the prasad will be served.
That is Mumbai.
I will admit that sometimes the drumbeats test both my patience and my windowpanes.
One group starts on the left. Another begins on the right. A third appears determined to inform the moon that Ganpati has arrived.
“Can they not play softly?” I ask.
“They are welcoming god,” somebody replies.
Yet this time, as I listened, the drums seemed to say something more.
They spoke of a city that has learnt to make room. Not always perfectly, and not without arguments, but instinctively. Mumbai knows that another person’s celebration does not reduce your own faith. A lamp lit in your neighbour’s house does not darken yours.
Even our narrow lanes seem to understand this better than some broad minded politicians. A procession approaches, traffic pauses, pedestrians squeeze themselves against walls, and shopkeepers watch patiently. Nobody asks which religion owns the road. For those few moments, everyone accepts that joy also requires space.
I thought of those grand photographs from the BRICS summit. Leaders stood together, smiling, clasping hands and displaying international unity for the cameras.
I wondered why an Indian leader could not turn to nations torn by religious conflict and say, “Look at us. Come and see how unity is lived.”
Then I paused.
Perhaps the invitation must first be sent to our own leaders.
Perhaps they need to visit Mumbai during Ganpati. They should enter a housing society where names, languages, foods and prayers are different, but where everybody moves a little to give Ganpati space.
Maybe the bullet train could bring them quickly.
Of course, by the time it arrives, the festival might be over. But Mumbai will still be here, crowded, quarrelsome, noisy and magnificently inclusive.
The drums will eventually stop.
The lesson should not.
Unity is not created at summits. It is created when neighbours make room for one another and discover that in doing so, nobody becomes smaller.
The city, and finally the nation becomes larger..!
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