Though Indian is mainly a land of villages, there are many cities as well in the country. Some of the cities like Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata are very big. They have a population of several millions. Life in these big cities is quite different from the life in a village. Let us here consider, in brief, the life in a big city and point out some of its important advantages and disadvantages.
In big cities we find good arrangements for education. Big colleges even universities, are found here. Even a person of ordinary means can give his sons and daughters the highest education according to their financial capacity. There are also a very large number of schools both for boys and girls in very city. They also provide well-equipped libraries and reading rooms for public use. Such arrangements do not exist in small towns and villages.
Cities also provide ample medical facilities. In every city, there are good hospitals in which the poor get free medicines and treatment. Many well-qualified private doctors are also there to serve the sick and the suffering. Lack of such medical arrangement is a drawback of villages.
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Besides this, cities also provide many fine opportunities for amusement and recreation. In every city there are a number of cinema houses and theatres, where we can enjoy the best pictures and dramatic performance. There are also a number of restaurants and hotels where we can get food, tea, etc, of the finest quality. There are also many parks and gardens where we can enjoy natural beauty at is best. The markets of the city, specially when brilliantly lighted at night, are better than many exhibitions and fairs.
The most important advantages of cities is the availability of avenues of employment. They are centres of trade and commerce. There are big offices as well as large number of factories and mills. Persons with every kind of qualification can easily find jobs to suit them. No such opportunities exist in villages where the people depend mostly on agriculture.
There are many other advantages of city life. City people are more cultured and refined. There we find opportunities to mix with people from every corner of the country as also from foreign countries. We meet people who have different nature, different ideas, and different ways of living and thinking. In this way, our outlook is broadened and our views enlarged.
Cities have many disadvantages also. The remark of the English poet Cowper “God made the country and man made the town” is quite true. In the City, we cannot enjoy the beauties of nature, as we can do in villages. City life is artificial. Man lives cut off from nature. He cannot appreciate the charms of birds and flowers, or the beauty of the day-dawn and the sunset as in villages.
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City life is extremely unhealthy. Air pollution, water pollution and sound pollution have converted the city life into hell. The smoke coming out a number of factories makes the atmosphere dirty. The sky is always covered with black clouds. The people get no opportunity to breathe free and pure air, or to enjoy clear sunshine. Beside this, food in the cities is dirty and adulterated. We cannot get pure milk and ghee. The food sold in the market is entirely unwholesome and unfit for consumptions. The villages suffer from no such drawbacks.
One has to face many difficulties in a big city. Life is every costly. People have to live with pomp and show. A simple life, like that of the villages, is impossible in the city. Beside, the cities are over-crowded and people get very little accommodation. Rates are high and newcomers have to put up with a great deal of hardship. Distances are long and much time is wasted in going from one place to another.
People in the city do not have much sympathy for others. There is no fellow-feeling. That sympathy and close interdependence which is so marked in villages life is entirely lacking in the city. Such is the life in big city. That is why many people do not like to live there. Others prefer it owning to its medical and cultural advantages. It is all a matter of taste. I, myself, like to live in a village in the close vicinity of a city so that I may enjoy the pleasures both of the city and the country.