i visited the mysore palace many years ago. and everyone tells you ‘come back at night, it looks gorgeous.’

it does. the entire palace gets lit up with a series of lights on every sunday night for around 45 minutes! you can see every bend, every curve and every edge. the palace shimmers in front of you. every inch defined.

i loved it.

and i was proud.
of how gorgeous it looked.
that the indian tourism department was taking it to another level!

years later, today i read an article in the paper. the palace is lit by 98000 and more bulbs. there are four power sub-stations for distribution of this power… which means around Rs. 80 – 90 lakhs on power consumption… all this while so many parts of india are still dark…

is it necessary? can india afford so much power consumption on just one monument while her people are in the dark? can the environment support this? is it worth it in the long run? is it right?

it’s lost its charm for me… what about you?