Sense and Sensibility

The timing of the release of Ray’s film, ‘Mahanagar’, couldn’t have been more ironic. The movie, which has been restored and is currently playing in city cineplexes much to the delight of Ray’s fans, opens with electric sparks coming out of the wires of a tramcar comfortably trundling through central Calcutta. Even Ray couldn’t have imagined that the ‘Pakhawaj’ playing in the background would be setting the mood just for his key protagonists but even for the current scenario of the story of Calcutta trams that are set to fade into the annals of a bygone era.

The authorities in their wisdom recently decided and announced that this iconic mode of public transport - now in its 150th year of running - must be discontinued other than a short heritage loop that for now, maybe kept running.

Though the tram routes have dwindled considerably from over 50 in their heydays to only three as of now, Kolkata is the only city in India where this mode of public transport can still be seen. It’s as much a part of the city’s visual legacy and heritage as are some of its most loved monuments and buildings. Glorious mercantile names such as ‘Jessop and Burn Standard’ were once associated with the trams.

Needless to say, there was an outpour of sentiment from all quarters. The quickest and first to fill were the ‘WhatsApp’ groups, where vintage photographs of trams started doing the rounds. Friends started reminiscing and sharing about their personal association with trams. For some, it was their chosen mode of transport. For others, it had been the street view that they grew up on. Some rued that an environmentally friendly vehicle, which is exactly the need of the hour was being discontinued whereas, for others, a slice of their childhood was being taken away from them.

My mind too raced back to my association with the trams of Calcutta. I must confess that I didn’t get a chance to use it too much while growing up. But thanks to our school that sat bang on a tram-lined main road, we grew up on the ding-dong sound of the rattling tram cars. A sound that is most comforting and embedded in my mind takes me back to sultry afternoons and classrooms.

Some friends who are also heritage enthusiasts got together and decided that instead of mourning, they would celebrate this iconic and much-loved mode of transport. All of them got together to take one more joyful tram ride together on a Sunday afternoon, cramming the two compartments with music and much melody: the shutterbugs pulling out their cameras to click every aspect of the tram from its bronze handles to its cobweb-ridden fans and from its interiors to its façade.

While the jury is still out on the final verdict and the fate of trams, this announcement and the whirlwind of sentiment and memory it has stirred also raises some pertinent points and questions about how to deal with losing something that hasn’t been a direct possession but has given you a sense of belonging. Questions about why we often postpone the appreciation of beauty in our own backyards, be it people, places or things until it is sometimes too late. Questions about how to accommodate the sensibility of a past as we make sense of an ever-evolving future. Questions about what we must forget to be practical.

A guest with a particularly keen eye, who was from out of town and was staying with me for a few days, remarked how most large Indian cities have begun to look similar and pointed out quite correctly that Kolkata fortunately, could still be told apart by its yellow ambassadors, its red minibuses and its last surviving trams. But alas, metropolises too in their race to look shiny don’t just shed their shabbiness. They end up losing their nuance and the oddities that are quite emblematic in their quest to make sense.

Author Supriya Newar may be reached at connect@supriyanewar.com, Instagram: @supriyanewar, Facebook: supriya.newar and LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/supriya-newar