Indore’s Tragedy: A Clean Image, Filthy Water, and Shameless Politics

Indore’s Tragedy: A Clean Image, Filthy Water, and Shameless Politics

By Jameel Ahmad Milansaar

If one were to read the tragedy of Indore merely as a bureaucratic headline, it would fit neatly within a few lines: contaminated water, a dozen dead, hundreds sick, one minister’s foul-mouthed outburst, and a perfunctory apology to close the file.

But India, as anyone who truly knows her will tell you, never yields stories that simple. This is not merely a mishap of urban infrastructure—it is a small aperture through which we glimpse the moral decomposition of power, the rot that festers beneath the manicured lawns of governance.

In the teeming quarters of Bhagirathpura, death didn’t come from violence or disease—it dripped quietly from the municipal taps. The very water meant to sustain life became its executioner. Beneath the pipelines, where sewage leaks into rusted arteries, lies the anatomy of an administration swollen with decay. The city that has for years flaunted its badge as “India’s Cleanest”, now stands exposed: sparkling streets on posters, stinking pipelines underground.

India’s politicians live at least two lives. The first unfolds in the full glare of election rallies—faces powdered, slogans ironed crisp—where every leader portrays himself as the servant of the poor and the custodian of justice. The second life, however, emerges when an uninvited question trespasses into their circle of comfort.

During the crisis, when a reporter asked the state’s Urban Development Minister about accountability, compensation, and the promise of safe water, the mask fell. “Fokat sawaal!” he sneered—a “useless question”—followed by an obscenity that revealed more truth than any policy statement ever could.

That fleeting flash of arrogance and irritability told the whole story. The minister’s contempt was not just for the question, but for the very act of being questioned. In that brief moment, India’s political temperament—authoritarian at heart, allergic to scrutiny—stood unclothed.

Later came the apology, that familiar ritual of damage control: I haven’t slept for two days. I was under stress. Words slipped out. I apologise if anyone was hurt.

But the problem was never the words—it was the mindset that spoke them. The first impulse of anger speaks the native tongue of power. The apology is merely its translation into PR.

For the opposition, every such scandal is a gold mine. The Congress released the video, inflated the death toll, and demanded resignation—knowing well that in India’s political culture, morality rarely costs a minister his chair. Yet the question lingers: how can a man preside over death from drinking water and still consider resignation an overreaction?

Meanwhile, the government did what governments do best—they issued figures. Three deaths here, four there, a hundred and fifty hospitalized, “many recovering,” “situation under control.” Words that sound calm on paper yet freeze the human heart when spoken aloud. Each figure conceals a grieving family, each symptom a silent scream stifled beneath the bureaucratic tone of “action taken.”

This tragedy, though flowing from Indore’s taps, belongs to the whole of India—a country that worships its rivers as goddesses yet lets its citizens die of poisoned water. The chants of “Swachh Bharat” still echo in the air, while beneath the ground, the rot seeps through pipes older than memory.

For journalists, the story carries another burden. When a minister calls a reporter’s question “fokat,” he is not insulting one individual but the very premise of journalism. It is a warning: good questions are those we have rehearsed answers for. All else is noise, nuisance, or conspiracy. Accept that rule, and journalism dissolves into advertising. Indore’s reporter committed the only sin that matters—he spoke in the language of accountability, not applause.

Indore’s dirty water is not just a civic failure—it is a mirror. In it, more than a minister’s vanity, we see our collective apathy. The scandal lives longer than the dead. We scroll past deaths as we do through newsfeeds, pausing only when power utters a profanity.

Perhaps one day, this nation will grow mature enough to demand not resignations, but reform—not just apologies, but answers. Until then, stories like Indore’s will continue to leak, drop by drop, staining our conscience while we call it progress. For now, clean taps will remain a luxury—and for the poor, even hope will be, as the minister said, fokat—free, and therefore worthless.

---