Dr.
Devendra K. Kothari
Population
and Development Analyst
Forum
for Population Action
Although
India is one of the less urbanized countries of the world with only 32 per cent
of her population living in urban areas, this country is facing a serious
crisis of urban growth can concentration at the present time. Whereas
urbanization has been an instrument of economic, social and political progress,
it has led to serious socio-economic problems in India.
The sheer magnitude of
the urban population, haphazard and unplanned growth of urban areas, and a
desperate lack of infrastructure are the main causes of such a situation. Almost all major
cities in India are facing serious problems of slum clearance, housing,
inadequate civic amenities for a fast growing population, absence of efficient
public transport system, the growing insecurity in the cities and so on.
Problems will become more acute and may go beyond repair if immediate steps are
not taken to solve at least some of these problems. Some major challenges faced
by emerging urbanization in India are:
Urban sprawl: In the past two decades, Indian
cities have grown tremendously—not only in population, but in geographic size.
For instance, Delhi’s urban area has almost doubled in the last 20 years. This
has led to an increase in average trip length from 8.5 kms to 10.4 kms, and
this commuting distance is projected to increase further in the coming years.
Sprawling cities and reliance on automobiles have contributed to traffic
congestion, air pollution, rising
greenhouse gas emissions, and poor public health. Ensuring that India’s cities
of the future are both livable and sustainable requires that decision-makers
find ways to shorten commuting distances and decrease urbanites’ reliance on
automobiles. Developing new urban planning is a need of hour.
Slums
and squatter settlements: During 2001-11, around 20 million rural
people migrated to cities/towns as compared to 14 million during the previous
decade. The greatest pressure of the immigrating population has been felt in
the slums of the city where the immigrants flock to their relatives and friends
before they search for housing. The census defines a slum as "residential areas where dwellings are
unfit for human habitation" because they are dilapidated, cramped, poorly
ventilated, unclean, or "any combination of these factors which are
detrimental to the safety and health".
Over 65 million or 17 per cent of urban population live in ‘identified’ slums in 2011, up from 52 million in 2001. With over 11 million of its residents in slums, Maharashtra has the highest slum population. Andhra Pradesh follows with over 10 million in slums, and West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh have over 6 million slum residents each. Over 1 million of Delhi’s 16 million residents live in ‘identified’ slums. The proportion of urban residents living in slums may be higher. State governments are unwilling to admit to their being more slums in their cities because then they will have to provide these slums basic services like water and drainage.
Indian cities abound with slums which have been termed as
‘eyesores’, a ‘rash’ on city landscape, ‘a blot on civilization’ etc. They are
much more health hazards for its unfortunate poverty stricken inhabitants and
also for the city as a whole. The most shocking aspect is that slums are
growing at an accelerated rate, especially in mega cities.
Mumbai with 48.9 per
cent of its population consisting of slum dwellers is the worst suffer. Dharavi
slum in Central Mumbai is the largest slum of Asia. Here some of the side
allays and lanes are so narrow that not even a bicycle can pass. The whole
neighborhood consists of tenement buildings, two or three storey high with
rusty iron stairways to the upper part, where a single room is rented by a whole
family, sometimes twelve or more people. In this place of shadow-less, treeless
sunlight, uncontrolled garbage, stagnant pools of foul water, the only
non-human creatures are the black crows and long gray rats.[1]
Waste disposal: As Indian cities grow in number and size
the problem of waste disposal is assuming alarming proportions. Huge quantities
of garbage produced by our cities pose a serious health problem. Most cites do
not have proper arrangements for garbage disposal and the existing landfills
are full to the brim. These landfills are hotbeds of disease and innumerable
poisons leaking into their surroundings. In a city like Bengaluru the solid waste
generated daily is estimated to be around 5000 tons. The collection, transportation
and disposal of this huge quantity of solid waste are posing serious problems
to the municipality. Finding dumping grounds for this waste has become
difficult. Dumping this sort of waste has created serious problems of
pollution, ill-health and stink to inhabitants even a kilometer away. Recycling
the solid waste material and converting much of it into usable products seems
to be the only solution.
Sewerage problems: Urban areas in India are almost invariably plagued with insufficient and inefficient sewage facilities. Not a single city in India is fully sewered. Resource crunch faced by the municipalities and unauthorized growth of the cities are two major causes of this pathetic state of affairs. According to latest estimates, only 35-40 per cent of the urban population has the privilege of sewage system. Most of the cities have old sewerage lines which are not looked after properly. Often sewerage lines break down or they are overflowing.
Water: Sadly, majority of the cities and towns do not get the
recommended quantity of water. Gap in demand and supply of water in four metro
cities, viz., Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi and Chennai varies from 10 to 20 per cent.
The condition is still worse in small cities and towns. Even some cities having population more than
100,000 are getting water supply two to three times in a weak. Many
towns have no main water supply at all and depend on such sources as individual
tube wells, open wells or even rivers.
To meet the growing
demand for water, many cities are trying to tap external sources of water
supply. Mumbai draws water from neighboring areas and from sources located as
far as 125 km in the Western Ghats. Chennai uses water express trains to meets
its growing demand for water. Bangalore is located on the plateau and draws
water from Cauvery river at a distance of 100 km. Water for Bangalore has to be
lifted about 700 metres with help of lifting pumps.
Public Transport: After housing and
waste disposal, another major problem faced by people in urban areas is the
lack of adequate public transport. The traffic scenario in almost all the Indian cities
presents a pathetic picture with Mumbai still having the best city transport
system and Chennai, Ahmedabad and Pune being reasonably well served by local
transport system. In all other cities, if one does not own a personal vehicle,
great hardship is experienced in moving about in the city.
As the cities are growing, distances to be
travelled for work and other reasons are increasing. With more than half the
population being poor or belonging to low income groups, public transport is a
very important facility to be provided in urban areas. Unfortunately, while the
richer classes are buying more and more two wheeler and four wheeler
automobiles, the average and below average citizen does not have access to
adequate and affordable transport facility. As the number of motor vehicles
increases, roads get cluttered, pollution increases and it takes longer to
reach one’s destination. Pedestrians and slow moving vehicles do not get
sympathetic treatment either by the authorities or the other road users.
Only recently local and state governments
have woken up to this problem and metro rail systems are being set up at great
cost for mass rapid transportation. Calcutta and more recently Delhi have very
well managed metro rail systems but they are still not adequate. Mumbai and
Chennai have had a long history of local train services but even they are
proving inadequate with populations in these cities growing rapidly. Cities like
Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Jaipur, etc. have
just provided elevated metro rail on a limited scale.
Presently people rely mostly on bus
transport but their number is not enough nor the roads able to accommodate all
the vehicles now in use. There are frequent traffic jams further delaying
people from reaching their destinations. The way forward is to restrict
severely individual transport and increase manifold public transport both by
road and rail. Public transport must be made much more efficient, regular, punctual,
attractive and adequate. Then the need for individual transports will go down
and the state would be able to put severe restrictions on use of individual
transport as is being done in Singapore.
Moreover, mixture of vehicles causes uncontrollable chaos on
the roads. Free movement of stray cattle and domestic animals on the roads adds
to traffic problems and often cause accidents. Heavy traffic and congestion
leads to slow movement of traffic, fuel wastage environmental pollution and
loss of precious time.
In short, almost all major cities in India
are facing serious problems of slum clearance, housing, inadequate civic
amenities for a fast growing population, absence of efficient public transport
system, the growing insecurity in the cities and so on. Problems will become
more acute and may go beyond repair if immediate steps are not taken to solve
at least some of these problems. Meanwhile the forecast is that half the
country’s population will be living in urban areas in another two to three decades.
So policy measures are needed to resolve the existing problems.
Policy actions initiated to mitigate urban challenges:
Making a strong pitch to
consider urbanization as an opportunity and not as a problem, GOI launched two
major schemes in 2015—Smart Cities mission, and Atal Mission for Rejuvenation
and Urban Transformation (AMRUT).
The AMRUT, which
replaces the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM), focuses of the
urban renewal projects to establish infrastructure that could ensure adequate
robust sewage networks and water supply for urban transformation.
Another important scheme is the Smart Cities Mission (SCM).
The first question is what is meant by a ‘smart city’. The answer is: there is
no universally accepted definition of a smart city. It means different things
to different people. In the approach of SCM, the objective is to promote cities
that provide core infrastructure and give a decent quality of life to its
citizens, a clean and sustainable environment and application of ‘Smart’
Solutions. The focus is on sustainable and inclusive development and the idea
is to look at compact areas, create a replicable model which will act like a
light house to other aspiring cities.
The Smart Cities
Mission is an urban renewal and retrofitting program
by the Government of India with
a mission to develop 100 cities by 2022 (the target has been revised to 109
cities) and these are being selected on the basis of a city challenge competition. Meant to change the
way urban India lives, smart cities will enjoy uninterrupted power and water
supplies, efficient public transport, internet connectivity, and e-governance
along with quality infrastructure. Under the smart city programme, each city
will be given Rs 500 crore by the Centre over five years. The states will have
to make a matching contribution.
The Smart Cities Mission,
a flagship programme for urban India, has been presented as a participatory and
inclusive development programme aimed at enhancing the lives and livelihoods of
citizens. This emphasis on participation and economic growth in the structure
of the Mission has been extraordinary and could lead to fundamental changes in
urban governance. In reality, however, participation has been uneven and the
structures upholding the Mission, ambiguous. These issues have led to several
kinds of resistance to the Mission — ranging from requests for amendments to
the city proposals to a rejection of the Mission itself — from both citizens
and the polity.
While the Smart Cities
Mission has been functioning for over a year, it has been critiqued on numerous
occasions, most recently by the Brookings India Institute and the Observer
Research Foundation (ORF), with repeated assertions that the idea of smart
cities has originated in countries whose socio-economic track records are
significantly better than India’s. [2] These reports have argued
that the notion of urban regeneration through the creation of smart cities
needs to be better theorized within the Indian context to allow for more
appropriate forms of urban improvement with a higher potential of effective
implementation.
One of the primary
concerns has been the creation of a company, called a Special Planning Vehicle
(SPV), in each selected city to operationalise the Mission at the local level.
The constitution and powers of the SPV are fraught with ambiguity and several
municipal bodies have been wary about engaging with an entity whose functions
seem to overlap with their own.
One of the main reasons for the apathy of urban local bodies
of some cities pertains to the Special Purpose Vehicle, which is to be
mandatorily constituted for the implementation of their respective Smart City
Plans. SPVs with private investments have been increasingly encouraged as an
efficient mechanism for infrastructure projects. This would be ideally seen as
an attractive option for urban local bodies struggling to meet investment
requirement. Then why have these local bodies been so disapproving of the smart
city SPVs?
According to media reports, the local bodies of Navi Mumbai,
Pune, Kochi and Nashik have indicated that the essence of ‘local
self-governance’ will be defeated with specific focus on private sector driven
SPVs. Successful implementation of smart city solutions needs
effective horizontal and vertical coordination between various institutions
providing various municipal amenities as well as effective coordination between
central government, state government and local government agencies on various
issues related to financing and sharing of best practices and service delivery
processes.
In
Pune, for instance, the local municipal cooperators and politicians fear a loss
of autonomy of the municipality and have demanded greater representation in the
board of the SPV. While these discussions could slow the pace of the Mission,
they may also lead to the construction of a more regulated and accountable body
as an outcome of resistance from the local polity. The Brookings India report
also flagged that clarity regarding the functions and role of the SPV in the
long-term would be critical for the Mission.[3]
Second,
the quality of citizen engagement in the Mission has also come under criticism.
The cities relied heavily on social media and telecom to reach out to citizens,
which was problematic because this strategy presupposed a certain level of
literacy and access to technology. The citizen resentment to the Mission in
Bhopal and Dehradun resulted in a rejection of the city proposals. Citizens in
Bhopal stated that they had not been consulted regarding the changes in Shivaji
Nagar and Tulsi Nagar and protested against the eviction notices sent to them.
Further,
the
much-touted project is courting fire from citizens for want of schemes that can
actually make a difference to their lives. For example, in recently held
the meeting of Smart Ajmer city Ltd (ASCL) in April, 2017, citizens
argued that while the project has no place for sewerage, drainage and traffic management
systems, highly 'impractical' schemes such as sharing cycles,
building Anasagar pathway, a
cultural park at Subhash Bagh and painting posh areas of the city figured
prominently.[4]
One
of the significant resistances to the mission has come from West Bengal, where
the state government has decided to opt out of competition and not submit
proposals for any other city. The state government, pending a formal
communication to the central government has put forth serious disagreements
over the financing pattern and the area-based focus of the Mission.
The
implications of the resistance are varied and need to be viewed in a
constructive manner. The absence of grievance architecture could result in
further resistance or worse, the creation of spatially and economically
polarized cities which conflict with the very ideology of the Mission.
Lastly, the selection of
big cities is not going to achieve the
objectives of the Mission. First 20
cities selected under SCM, 16 are having population one million or more in 2011.[5] Some important selected million cities are:
Chennai (8.6 million), Ahmadabad, (6.3 million), Pune (5.1 million), Surat,
(4.6 million) Jaipur (3.1 million), Kochi (2.1 million), Indore (2.1million),
and Bhopal (2.0 million). And in such large cities, already having wasted
interests, it would be difficult to achieve the objectives of the Mission to
make cities vibrant and livable.
Infrastructure investments in small-sized
cities can be cost-effective. The concentration of population and enterprises
in urban areas greatly reduces the unit cost of piped water, sewers, drains,
roads, electricity, garbage collection, transport, healthcare and schools.
However, the cost-effectiveness of such investments is reduced when they are
made too late. For instance, when informal settlements or slums are allowed to
proliferate, it becomes more difficult and more expensive to install
infrastructure and services because no prior provision has been made for the
settlement’s development. Moreover, population densities and the spatial
configuration of slums often do not allow for the subsequent development of
roads, sewerage systems and other facilities that are easy to install in less
dense and better-planned localities. Moreover, due to relatively less political
interferences, it will be easy to expand job opportunities and that will
facilitate rural-urban migration. I, therefore, believe that concept of
developing smart cities is good but the selected cities should not have
population more than 200,000 each or even less.
The
Mckinsey report on urbanization entitled “India’s urban awakening: Building
inclusive cities, sustaining economic growth” predicts that 590 million people
will live in cities of India by 2030. To accommodate this explosive growth,
India would need at least 20-30 new smart cities.
The concluding post discusses: Need for rethinking about urban governance.
[1]
Refer
article by Smriti Chand at: http://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/urbanisation/11-major-problems-of-urbanisation-in-india/19880/
[2] Refer
article:To succeed, citizens must have more say in the Smart Cities Mission by Persis Taraporevala and Bhanu Joshi at: http://www.hindustantimes.com/analysis/to-succeed-citizens-must-have-more-say-in-the-smart-cities-mission/story-PgWgFXSbgaTcdQldOgRJpK.html. Also see article: The top 10 implementation challenges for smart
cities in India by
Pratap Padode
at
http://realty.economictimes.indiatimes.com/realty-check/author/319/pratap-padode
[3] Refer: BUILDING
SMART CITIES IN INDIA, 2016, BROOKINGS INDIA AND BROOKINGS INSTITUTION,
WASHINGTON.
[4] Refer news item: Citizens train guns on
smart city schemes, at:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ajmer/citizens-train-guns-on-smart-city-schemes/articleshow/58200588.cms?
[5] These cities are: 1 Bhubaneswar,
2 Pune, 3 Jaipur, 4 Surat, 5 Kochi, 6 Ahmadabad, 7 Jabalpur, 8 Visakhapatnam, 9 Solapur, 10 Davangere, 11 Indore, 12 New Delhi Municipal Corporation, 13 Coimbatore, 14 Kakinada, 15 Belagavi, 16 Udaipur,17 Guwahati, 18 Chennai, 19 Ludhiana, and 20 Bhopal.
