How come people don't shoot and loot in Mumbai the way they do in New Orleans?

AFP:

In New Orleans there was shooting and looting when the floods came last week. When a similar inundation struck India's financial capital Mumbai a month earlier, there was no violence, just free wada-pav bread.

Residents say street vendors passed out the "wada-pav", potato-filled bread, to their fellow citizens wading through waist-high water in a sign that the disaster, which killed more than 400, brought the city together rather than tearing it apart as appeared to happen in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina struck the US southern Gulf coast one week ago.

The street vendors' response seems to symbolize what South Asians say is the region's familiarity with, and resilience in the face of, numerous natural calamities.

"What we are seeing in USA is complete chaos," said Farida Lambe, vice president of the Nirmala Niketan College of Social Work which helped in relief and rehabilitation work during the Mumbai floods.

"My assessment is that many of the problems arose as the people are not used to facing calamities. They expect complete efficiency and find it difficult to cope if it does not come about."

US newspapers have criticized the slow response by the administration of President George W. Bush to the hurricane, many of whose victims are poor blacks.

"We do not go about looting like we saw in the TV reports from the US," said Mrinmoye Nath, a nurse at a local hospital in western Assam.

The northeastern Indian state is home to a separatist insurgency and also sees annual floods that wash away villages, destroy crops and lead to a huge loss of life.

More than 400 people died in late July and early August when days of heavy rain turned the streets of Mumbai, formerly known as Bombay, into rivers.

Mumbai police commissioner A.N. Roy confirmed there were no cases of looting, arson or violence when the floods hit.

"Even stray cases of robbery were not heard or reported," he said.

Mumbai has nearly 20 million residents. New Orleans had about 500,000.

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