When civic sense becomes a crime

Two recent incidents should make us deeply uncomfortable - not merely because two men were brutally killed, but because both were attacked for doing something that should be considered entirely normal in a civilised society: asking others to respect basic civic sense.

In one case, Chongtham Vikram Singh, a musician and music teacher from Manipur, was allegedly beaten to death in South Delhi after he objected to a group of men creating a disturbance outside his home. Police have arrested seven adults and apprehended a minor; the investigation is also examining other aspects of the case. In another, Amit, Gupta, a 47-year-old businessman in Kanpur, died after allegedly being brutally assaulted by four intoxicated youths when he objected to one of them urinating on the roadside.

These are not simply two more crime stories. They should force us to ask what kind of society we are becoming.

This question becomes even more important in a country aspiring to become a developed nation within the next two decades - a country where Swachh Bharat has been one of the most prominent public campaigns of the last decade. Sanitation, however, was never supposed to be merely about constructing toilets. The government’s own Swachh Bharat framework explicitly recognised behavioural change as a central objective, along with awareness of the links between sanitation and public health.

So, what has gone wrong?

Look around our cities. Chaos has become almost normal. We are facing infrastructural deficiencies, inadequate basic amenities, shrinking public spaces, increasing noise, pollution, congestion and a growing sense that the city belongs to whoever can occupy or dominate a space.

Cities are expanding at an enormous pace, but public space is increasingly being treated as a commodity. Every available piece of land seems to have a commercial value. Roads, bridges, flyovers and buildings are celebrated as symbols of development, while potholes, broken footpaths, dysfunctional public schools, inadequate public health facilities and poorly maintained public toilets continue to define everyday urban life.

People are frustrated. But instead of directing that frustration towards systems, policies and institutions, much of it is increasingly being directed at fellow citizens. That is dangerous.

Some energy is emerging, particularly among Gen Z and other citizens demanding accountability from the system. But millions continue to silently negotiate the gaps and lacunae in policies, planning and public services. And when accumulated frustration eventually erupts, the nearest individual often becomes the target.

This is not merely a law-and-order problem. It is also a social and psychological problem.

The noise we have normalised

Take the Delhi incident. We have developed an extraordinary tolerance for disturbing other people’s peace in public spaces. People routinely play songs, reels, videos and voice messages on speaker mode in buses, railway stations, airports, hospitals, restaurants and other shared spaces. Groups sitting at neighbouring tables in the restaurants and office spaces often speak loudly without the slightest consideration for others.

And if somebody asks them to lower their voice or use earphones, the person asking is sometimes labelled as “uncivil”.  I have faced it myself, several times. Actually, the opposite is true.

Human beings need to communicate. We need to laugh, celebrate, grieve, vent and share. But public life requires an understanding that our freedom ends where it begins to seriously interfere with another person's right to peace, privacy and dignity. Civility is not about suppressing ourselves. It is about understanding that other people exist. Unfortunately, this basic understanding is becoming weaker.

When public urination becomes a male privilege

The Kanpur incident exposes another deeply entrenched problem. 

Public urination has been normalised in India to such an extent that some men appear to consider their ability to urinate wherever they want almost a matter of entitlement. Yet the same society imposes an entirely different standard on women. A man may casually relieve himself against a wall in broad daylight. A woman often has to search for a hidden corner or hold her urine until she finds a safe and private toilet.

This is not merely about cleanliness. It is about dignity, safety, gender and public health. And here we encounter the contradiction at the heart of our sanitation campaigns. We conduct awareness drives, organise events and make declarations, but behavioural change cannot be an annual campaign. It has to become part of everyday life.

The government’s own Swachh Bharat experience acknowledges that information, education and behaviour-change communication are critical to sustaining sanitation gains. The same problem is visible with single-use plastic. I have personally seen people walk out of awareness programmes organised against plastic and immediately use and throw plastic items.

Awareness has become an event. It needs to become a habit.

The missing conversation about urban life

There is another dimension that we rarely discuss. Our cities are becoming increasingly stressful, congested, noisy and alienating. The loss of public spaces, the decline of neighbourhood interactions and the relentless conversion of urban land into commercial and residential real estate are not merely planning issues. They affect how people live with one another.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has increasingly emphasised the connection between urban planning, mental health, safe and inclusive communities, green spaces and access to community spaces. It specifically notes that well-designed urban environments can reduce noise and pollution while promoting social interaction, recreation and relaxation. Green and blue spaces are not decorative luxuries either. Evidence cited by WHO links them with stress reduction, social cohesion, physical activity and mental well-being.

This is why our obsession with grey infrastructure as the primary definition of development is deeply misplaced. A city is not merely a collection of roads, bridges, flyovers, malls, towers and parking lots.  A city is a living social ecosystem.

We need to invest in people

Our urban governance systems therefore need a much broader strategy. We need infrastructure, certainly. But we also need planned and sustained investment in behavioural change, community engagement, public spaces, green and blue infrastructure, neighbourhood networks and civic education.

Community vigilance can play an important role, but people must also be trained and oriented to respond to conflicts without escalating them. The objective should be to build communities where people intervene constructively, support vulnerable citizens and resolve everyday conflicts before they turn violent. 

Urban citizens cannot be treated merely as taxpayers, consumers and users of infrastructure. They are citizens. And citizenship comes with both rights and responsibilities.

Cities must therefore stop treating every inch of available land as an opportunity for commercialisation. We need spaces where people can meet without having to buy something. Spaces where children can play, older people can sit, young people can interact, communities can celebrate and strangers can learn to coexist. Public space is not vacant space. It is social-ecological infrastructure.

And perhaps this is where the idea of a Viksit Bharat needs to be discussed.

A developed country is not simply one with multi-billion-dollar infrastructure. It is one where people can live with dignity, where public spaces are safe and accessible, where citizens respect laws, where differences do not automatically become sources of conflict, and where basic civility is not considered weakness.

The murders of Chongtham Vikram Singh and Amit Gupta should therefore not be treated as isolated aberrations. The perpetrators must face the full force of the law, but the rest of us must look beyond the immediate crime. What kind of urban society are we creating? A society of increasingly impressive concrete structures inhabited by increasingly frustrated and intolerant people? Or cities where infrastructure and humanity grow together?

Climate change, heat, overcrowding, pollution and poorly planned urbanisation are already adding new layers of stress to urban life. We cannot afford to respond to these pressures only with more concrete. We need to invest in people, peace, empathy, civic sense and community.

Being Viksit is not merely about building bigger cities. It is about building better citizens and more humane communities. Development is not merely about infrastructure; it is about building civilisations where people live with one another in peace and harmony.

Views expressed are the author’s own and don’t necessarily reflect those of Down To Earth