Back from a flash visit to Ahmedabad. What warmed the cockles of my heart most was the tag of a "megacity" being appended to my erstwhile abode. The infusion of a big chunk from the exchequer's trunk seems to have done the same wonders to this city that an efficient make up man can do with good "old" Rajnikant(h). The roads were wider, the air cleaner and the junta agog with praise for the face lift. Sparkling new malls adorned the skyline where solitary mom and pop shops ruled roost. A sure sign of things being north bound I commiserated. Something, however, rankled like a stone in the good morsel that didnt let me plunge headlong in my ecstasy. It took me a visit to the local grocery store to put a finger on the root of the qualm. There it was, in all its glory ( or the lack of it ) shipping off sundry items at the rate of a kilo or a half. The place has been like that for as long as I can remember ( and I do boast of an "elephantine" memory). But that wasnt supposed to be a heritage site to be preserved. The owner seemed to have been stuck in the economic spiral with no vertical movement at all. My query about why he hasnt moved to a bigger place or ventured into something new met with the quitessential puzzled look. "I am happy with what I have, Sir. Am better off without those headaches of taxes, documentation and management that accrue with expansion". A blight for Gujarati enterprise I thought but the guy was there everywhere I looked. In my neighbour who runs an automobile spare parts agency and in my bank where the new computers were as much a spectator of stagnancy as I was. Coudnt lay my eyes on anything that was out of place, somebody who moved into a new apartment or a new office. Enquiring about the new commercial complexes told me that the investment was from people outside Ahmedabad on almost all counts. The city seemed to forge ahead but it was an illusion. It was just the skin that got polished. The skeleton still was weak and dormant. A telling tale of how the red tape and more so, a self imposed alienation from the main stream can dwindle a budding city's aspirations. I doubt if Ahmedshah really saw the hare killing the dog when he set forth setting up this place.