Whither Excellence?

While travelling on the newly constructed or expanded six-laned national highways, one cannot help admiring the quality of driving that has improved so much during the last decade or so. No doubt, the road infrastructure throughout the nation has gone better and is still being made even better. Our honourable minister Mr Nitin Gadkari seems to be obsessed with laying new roads at a breakneck pace. His detractors may contend that all this is being done for some vested interests. But that’s not the issue I want to get into. What I have noticed while driving on these roads are the loose ends which have been left unfinished or under-finished. For instance, the rain water drains that run along the highways are faulty or not functional at all. The edges of the roads can be scraggy or uneven. The road signs can be badly placed or altogether missing. Even a cursory glance can tell that the infrastructure lacks the finesse that would impart a pleasant look and of course, make it last longer. It’s not only true for roads. It’s true for almost every public structure. The newest buildings may have dripping coats of paint, uneven plastering, badly levelled floors and what not. The question is why can’t we bring a thing to near perfection? Is it because the public money is nobody’s money? Or we have developed an attitude of taking the things too casually. Or the public servants do not bother how the public money is utilized or plundered.
And perhaps this is the reason; we are having a lot of buildings but hardly any monument. Post partition, we hardly have any structure that coming generations can be proud of. The awe-inspiring temples of the South or the forts of Rajasthan or the Mughal monuments remain unmatched. It is quite an acclaimed fact that the Taj remains probably the most symmetrical building of the world. (For those who have seen Taj Mahal, the asymmetric graves in its basement were not the architect’s fault). Some of the readers may say that these structures were built by tyrants under the yoke of the whip. They were spending the looted money. Agreed. Still, they saw that the amount they were spending did not go waste.
Meenakshi temple, Madurai is over a thousand years old, the Taj Mahal was completed in 1653, the Amer Fort, Jaipur continues to exist in its present form since the sixteenth century – do we have any such masterpiece of the contemporary times? Please don’t cite the Statue of Unity. It’s pretty new and thus its lasting value is yet to be ascertained.
Satinder Sartaj, the celebrated Punjabi singer in one of his songs says
Chaar hi tarikya naal banda kare kam sada
Shounk naal pyar naal laalach ja dande naal
ie a man performs a job only in four ways viz his liking, love, greed or when forced or terrorized. When public money is involved, there may not be terror but there must be a fear that the person responsible for spending is accountable and answerable.Some of the readers may laugh at my unrealistic and almost impossible musings. But this casualness, indifference or carelessness can be infectious. It may not spread as rapidly as the current pandemic but it will slowly and surely advance in an unobtrusive manner and by the time we detect it, it would have spread to our families engulfing our sons and daughters in this mire of mediocrity.
I know that perfection can never be achieved. However, we have to realize that perfection may not be attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence. And excellence never goes out of fashion. We watch a lot of people come and talk on television but when we listen to Harsha Bhogle or Amitabh Bachchan or Shashi Tharoor, we sit up and are all ears because these icons are nearly perfect in their oratorical skills. Excellence lies in taking care of details. Sholay, Mughal-e-Azam or even Titanic – are excellent films because of the way detailing have been done in all the aspects of cinema.
As mentioned earlier, perfection may not be possible but excellence can be pursued. Let there be any field. I may quote a story; I am not sure about its veracity. I heard it when I was very young. The story goes like this. A king in China wanted to get a palace constructed. He asked his architect after approving the plans and blue prints about the number of bricks to be needed in the construction. He wanted the palace to be constructed with a unique sized bricks and the die for it would never be used again. He asked the architect to take some time for calculations.
After a week or so the architect gave the exact number of bricks required. The king looked at the figure quizzically and asked if he was sure about his calculations. The architect nodded reverentially. The king ordered him to calculate again because he would put him to gallows if the bricks turned out to be less or more. The architect retreated to his work station and after a couple of days came to the court and requested the king to increase the quantity by one. The king was aghast. He questioned him again if those were his final calculations. The architect moved his head in affirmation. The king warned him of the consequences if the numbers varied later on. The architect stood his ground. It is said that on completion of the palace that one extra brick was left over and the king put it on a public display as an example of perfection.
This story may be a myth but another one I am going to narrate is absolute truth. A student of mine was working with a national news portal. Though he was very meticulous himself, his immediate boss was a few notches above him in perfection. He told me about an incident. He said that he had written a story after months of research and had got the final draft ready after numerous revisions. He admitted that he was proud of his attempt and was sure that his boss would certainly approve it. When he submitted it to her, she went over it twice, thrice and the fourth time with a smug expression hardly finding any mistake or suggesting any change. After fifth or sixth reading on her screen, she moved the cursor and put a comma in one of the sentences and muttered approvingly, “Now, it’s perfect.” That’s the kind of bosses we need.
So, the next time you find a new railway over bridge or flyover in your city, do check whether its underside has been properly developed or maintained. Do notice whether the landing of the over bridge or the flyover has smoothly merged with the road, whether the debris have been removed from the sidings or not. Otherwise do tweet to Mr Gadkari. Jokes apart, we all need to inculcate the spirit of excellence. We may not achieve perfection but our pursuit for it should be relentless.

My latest blog dated 28th April, 2021