Mothering Mumbai: The City Needs Compassionate Governance As Much As Mega Projects

As the world reflected on Mother’s Day yesterday, a day associated with care, protection, and the countless invisible acts that make everyday life smoother for those we love, perhaps that is also the question Mumbai must ask itself today: can a city be governed with the same instinct of care that defines motherhood?

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The appointment of Ashwini Bhide as the first woman municipal commissioner of the BMC naturally carries symbolic importance. But beyond symbolism lies a deeper civic expectation. Can Mumbai’s governance become not only more ambitious but also more compassionate toward the daily realities of ordinary citizens?

Cities are usually judged by their skyline changing projects. Coastal roads, metro lines, flyovers, and tunnels dominate public discourse because they are visible, measurable, and politically significant. Mumbai unquestionably needs these investments.

Yet, every large infrastructure project comes with disruption before relief finally arrives. Roads are dug up. Dust rises. Traffic is diverted. Commutes worsen. Citizens tolerate these hardships because they hope the long-term gains will justify the pain. And often, they do. The Coastal Road has brought meaningful relief to thousands of commuters. Metro will transform mobility across the city. But infrastructure alone cannot solve every urban problem. In many places, congestion has merely shifted from one stretch to another. A faster corridor often ends in a chaotic bottleneck beyond it.

More importantly, mega projects operate on long timelines. Mumbai does not just need infrastructure upgrades today; it needs relief. Relief from the endless congestion, broken roads, flooding, dust, noise, and the daily exhaustion that has become normal for its citizens. Which is why Mumbai also needs another form of governance, one focused not only on the city of 2040 but also on the lived experience of 2026.

The good news is that many improvements do not require thousand-crore projects or decade-long gestation periods. Some of the most effective reforms require something far simpler: data, analytics, technology, compassion, coordination, and administrative intent.

Take traffic management. Mumbai generates enormous movement data every day through cameras, GPS systems, toll points, signals, and mobile networks. Why not use this data intelligently to identify encroachments and recurring choke points by time and cause? Instead of reacting to congestion after it occurs, the authorities can predict and manage it. Signal timings can be adjusted dynamically. Diversions can be pre-planned. Illegal parking hotspots can be continuously monitored rather than periodically targeted.

For the ease of living of Mumbaikars, the BMC should also adopt far stronger internal accountability mechanisms. Every road stretch dug up in the city should be digitally monitored and publicly tracked: where, why, and for how long? Citizens deserve visibility into disruptions they are forced to endure.

Consider garbage collection. Why should garbage trucks occupy roads during peak traffic hours? A transition toward nighttime collection could immediately help. Even marginal reductions in traffic during rush hours can significantly improve commuter experience in densely packed Mumbai.

Parking presents another obvious low-hanging fruit. Residential parking spaces remain vacant during office hours while nearby commercial districts choke with illegal parking. Parking spaces in commercial buildings remain underused at night while residents struggle for space near their homes in the same neighbourhood. A tech-enabled shared parking framework using Aadhaar-verified users, digital permissions, and incentives, such as property tax rebates for participating societies, could unlock existing capacity.

Emergency access requires even greater urgency. Every fire tragedy reminds Mumbai how dangerously narrow many roads have become because of indiscriminate roadside parking. Fire tenders losing precious minutes navigating blocked lanes is not an inconvenience; it is a civic failure. There should be zero tolerance for parking on designated emergency corridors.

Technology can further strengthen enforcement. Mumbai can deploy agile electric two-wheeler squads equipped with cameras to continuously record parking violations and obstruction points. Fast, mobile enforcement is far better suited to Mumbai’s narrow roads than bulky vehicles trapped in the same congestion.

The city should also begin discussing congestion charges rationally, starting with commercial trucks and tempos entering arterial roads during peak hours. Technology is readily available.

Now, let’s look at citizen services. Why should a bereaved family have to run from pillar to post just to get a death certificate? The same is true for other records as well.

Mumbai’s civic transformation also requires citizen participation. Annual competitions for the cleanest housing societies, markets, and neighbourhoods across wards can encourage behavioural change far more effectively than fines alone. Similarly, developers and corporates can be encouraged to support hyperlocal beautification and greening. Urban exhaustion is not caused only by traffic. It is also caused by ugliness, disorder, heat, and noise.

This is where the metaphor of motherhood becomes meaningful. A mother does not only think about her child’s distant future; she also worries about whether the child reached home safely today, ate properly, or struggled unnecessarily. Indian cities desperately need that same instinct of care.

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Visionary projects matter enormously. But so do today’s broken footpaths, garbage timing, parking chaos, and commute stress. As the reflections around Mother’s Day continue, the aspiration from Mumbai’s first woman municipal commissioner is that she governs with the spirit of care that great cities, and great mothers, ultimately share: making everyday life a little more secure, dignified, and livable for the people who depend on them.

Mumbai will remember the infrastructure that gets built. But it will remember even more the administrator who reduced the daily friction, stress, and exhaustion of living in this city. In the end, it is for Ashwini Bhide to decide what kind of legacy she would like to leave behind.

The writer is a retired IRS officer and Ex-Chief of Surveillance at SEBI. Advisor to corporates, market participants and tech entrepreneurs.

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