Lucknow: Photo Essay
A beautiful woman poses with her baby while I was walking through the streets of Lucknow.
Lucknow Market:
Wedding processions such as these usually happen during the late evening:
Rolls of red cloth, mattresses and chairs being collected, part of the wedding preparations:
Cycle Rickshaw's:
I was amazed by Mayawati's megalomania, she has started building several massive statues and structures of herself all over Lucknow, especially when you just drive in. There are also going to be statues of Kanshi Ram, her guru. The taxi driver told us there would be rows of elephants built on either side of the road since the elephant is a symbol of her party, the BSP.
This is a picture of one such monument being built. I don't know if the scale is clear here, we couldn't stop since it was a highway. Anyway, its a huge thing with domes, with a large park area, one main structure, and several smaller structures being built around it to honour not only herself but also her guru.
Interestingly, the same taxi driver pointed out that she could use the lakhs of rupees on something useful like building factories and generating employment instead of frivolous stuff like statues of herself. I was impressed, and reminded of the hard fact that somebody like the taxi driver I was talking to was more involved in politics than me, and was perfectly capable of seeing Mayawati as she was, practically. I think this hints that she may not go further than CM of UP (hopefully).
Rai's Competition Center (photo below): Its strange, I have never seen anything like this in any of the metro cities, one of the signs says "Kanpur Private BA Gram Panchayat" - What does this mean??
The other sign says "22 law q" - I'm guessing this place sells books and tips on how to pass the various exams listed on the main yellow and red signboard: Railway (government job), SSC (10th grade), Bank (some bank exam?), IAS-PCS (government exam again), Medical (which exam is not mentioned), B.Ed (Teacher?), LL.B (Law), CDS, NDA (Army), and Engineering. What's interesting is the way all these exams and more are just listed randomly, a dhobi list totally.
