Mayors: City of Hope

IT’S A PRETTY INCREDIBLE THING TO SPEND 23 DAYS in jail for civil disobedience and also win an award as “India’s best politician,” but that’s just what Sheila Dikshit of Delhi has achieved – just one of many remarkable exploits of an accomplished life. One of only a few women mayors in large cities around the globe, she remains a force to be reckoned with and a politician of decision.Quite simply, she’s had it with the way women and girls have traditionally been treated in India, but sees the issue as merely part of a larger lack of political will to combat poverty and class tensions. To raise the profile of such issues, she became a member of the Indian delegation to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. Highly respected, she nevertheless spent time in jail for demonstrating against the atrocities committed against women in Uttar Pradesh state – an incident that only added to her legend.She firmly declares, however, that she has no intention of being a one-issue mayor. “I was a citizen before I came a politician,” she states firmly, and believes her responsibility is to the citizens of Delhi and not just the powerful interests. Her way of achieving that lofty goal is interesting. She is pressing the national government to declare large Indian municipalities like Delhi, Mumbai (former Bombay), and Kolkata (Calcutta in English), as “city-states” so that they can attain the power necessary to deal effectively with their own personal challenges. In other words, she desires to change the national picture from the inside out and views cities as the great generator for that kind of change. She clearly states her intention:“I am sure politically no one would agree with this, but I think administratively it would be good for the country’s development to create city-states and give them the power to undertake development. They should not be under the state governments but rather under their own chief minister or chief administrator or whatever you want to call the position.”She even has a label for it: the “insurgent city.” That kind of outlook means that, by choice, Sheila Dikshit has turned the mayoralty radical. She has vowed to end the slums, construct a sustainable infrastructure, develop public transport, and spend decades creating equality. “You just can’t do it with the same old administration where you’re dependent on various governments for every penny.” Interestingly, as mayor, she has become a radical for her citizens, overturning centuries of oppressive gender and financial practices.Cities, and civilization, have a long way to go when you can count on one hand that number of female mayors of the planet’s largest cities. We’ll never get there by fiat, legislation, or human rights until mayors themselves step forward and fight history to achieve them. Sheila Dikshit, now a three-term mayor, is showing the way. Change doesn’t happen by law, but by dedication and radicalism in various fashions.As author Raymond Williams puts it: “To be truly radical is to make hope possible rather than despair convincing.” That is Sheila Dikshit. And that is what a mayor can do. As she states it herself: “Delhi has changed from a cynical city to a city of hope.” Canada itself needs such mayors.