Sreelatha Menon: Life sucks, and official reports agree!

MY WEEK

The week kind of took off from where TS Eliot once did a famous poem. But I wouldn't say yet that April is the cruellest month what with so many flowers still blooming in at least the NDMC roundabouts in New Delhi if not in the little apartments, hutments and unauthorised colonies that make up the capital city-state.

But talking of abodes, I woke up to discover that I had lost mine. Well almost. I was at the receiving end of the harsh effects of the rising interest rates on home loans and the banks ceasing to be as warm about offering them, something our editor had ruminated on over last weekend. My bank showed me the door halfway through. I had taken a construction-linked loan and only half of the loan had been paid by the bank to the builder. The recent increases in interest rates and the income tax-related cuts in salaries forced me to default in payments. The bank has asked me to look for refinance or probably lose the house.

A cloudburst of miseries in the form of a government report on child abuse drowned my little loss. Children were not safe anywhere. Does the government need a report to know this? The week was taking shape for the social sector I am supposed to write on.

Tuesday

With children at the back of my mind, I saw things in their worst light when the next catastrophe was pronounced: The intergovernmental panel on climate change and its third working group was ready with its report. Doomsday scenarios filled my mind with predictions of apocalypse striking as close as 2020 and as distant as only 2080. Sinking cities, water scarcity, wheat shortages""my head spun as I tried to plan stories on sustainable development.

Wednesday

Sustainable development was indeed the flavour of the week just as Special Economic Zones dominated the previous few weeks. A World Bank report on sustainable development for India drew attention to the suicidal path that India was treading in its name. Conservationists like Shekhar Singh posed the question: Does our environment GDP match our economic GDP? If it is less, our GDP figures are not accurate. He likened the situation to a group of party-goers bingeing like there's no tomorrow for one whole month. They drink the best champagne, gobble the best food and have a rollicking time overall, but at the end of it, they are left with nothing to carry on with. Stop celebrating.

Thursday

Amidst doomsday forecasts and my daughter's fallen face at the prospect of losing our flat, I decided to take a break. My doctor pronounced me unfit, stressed out and with high blood pressure! Was it global warming, the Nitharis around me, the OBC quota dilemmas or the EMIs? But there was reason to cheer. My parents came visiting at last from Kerala.