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81. Census Towns in India - Current Patterns and Future Discourses

Author:
Shamindra Nath Roy and Jaya Prakash Pradhan
Publication Date:
05-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
The surge in census towns (CTs) during Census 2011 has drawn a lot of attention to the ongoing and future dynamics of these in-situ urban settlements in India. Using the village level information from the previous and current censuses, the present study attempts to identify the villages that can be classified as a census town in 2021. While the prevailing dataset bears some obstacles for a neat identification of such settlements, it can be observed that a fairly high number of rural areas may be classified as CTs in future, which currently accommodates a population of 17.9 million. While the current nature of regional distribution of these areas may not vary much over the future, their areal characteristics over time portray multiple spatial processes undergirding India’s urban trajectory. A lot of these prospective CTs are also relatively prosperous than their current rural neighbourhoods, which reinforces the persistence of similar pattern of urban transformation in future.
Topic:
Demographics, Development, Urbanization, Census, and Rural
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

82. Engines without Drivers: Cities in India’s Growth Story

Author:
Partha Mukhopadhyay
Publication Date:
03-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
It is now almost axiomatic that cities are the engines of growth. Historically, federal support programmes have focused on rural areas, but over the past fifteen years, the need to devise such programmes for urban local bodies has come to be recognised, with JNNURM in its various forms, being the most visible early manifestation. This trend has continued, even strengthened, in this government and among the menu of urban support programmes on offer from the Government of India, the vision of the city as the engine of growth is most clearly evident in the Smart City Mission, with its focus on area based development – like an engine within the city. Yet, even in the mainstream economics literature, while there is evidence for cities as places of higher productivity, there is less evidence for cities as drivers of growth – with learning being the primary driver and urban primacy being an important obstacle. The primary questions are whether cities are places of learning, whether there are identifiable mechanisms of such learning and the kind of city institutions – economic, social and political – that facilitate such learning. This paper will interrogate the empirical characteristics of such urban institutions in India in the context of the theoretical literature and learning mechanisms that emerge from international evidence. In particular, it will argue that the nature of the labour market, which is largely contractual, the transfer of rural fragmentation in social relations to cities and the absence of city-level political agency, all reduce the potential of the city as a location of learning economies. For cities to even have the possibility of being engines of growth, we need to ensure that drivers of these engines are in place and we have a mechanism to think about paths to follow.
Topic:
Development, Government, Urbanization, and Economic growth
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

83. Officiating Urbanisation: What makes a settlement officially urban in India?

Author:
Bhanu Joshi and Kanhu Charan Pradhan
Publication Date:
01-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
Financial incentives including government support grants for infrastructure creation, health and education development in many countries is contingent on where people live. In India, the allocation of critical government subsidies explicitly recognises urban population as a criterion for budgetary allocation. Yet, the fundamental question about what is an urban area and what does it entail to be recognised as an urban settlement in India remains understudied. This paper aims to understand the definitional paradigm of statutory towns in India. We create a novel dataset of all state laws in India on the constitution of urban local governments. We analyse the eligibility criteria that would qualify any area to become urban local bodies under the law in different states and find large variation among states. In our dataset, only fifteen of the twenty-seven states explicitly define and have laws on urban settlements. Within these fifteen states, we find that many small and transitional urban areas violate the eligibility criteria laid down by the state laws constituting them. We further find that states which do not provide statutory laws rely on executive fiat, i.e. it is the prerogative of the state government to declare the creation of a statutory town. What then becomes or “unbecomes” urban in these states is open to dispute. The full extent of this variation and reasons thereof can open up new avenues of scholarship.
Topic:
Government, Infrastructure, Urbanization, Budget, and Legislation
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

84. Closing the Enforcement Gap: Community-led Groundtruthing of Environmental Violations in Mormugao, Goa

Author:
CPR-Namati Environmental Justice Program
Publication Date:
12-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
The Mormugao Port is located at Vasco bay in the Mormugao taluka of Goa at the point where the Zuari river meets the Arabian Sea. This region is home to thousands of fisherfolk from the Karvi community who live along the beaches of Mormugao, Salcete and Tiswadi talukas. It is a natural harbour that provides safe haven for ships and fishing vessels during storms, like it did in 2017 when cyclone Okchi hit this coast. The lives and livelihood of these fisherfolk are intrinsically linked to the activities of Mormugao port as they have had to share their customary livelihood areas – the sea and the beaches – with the port. This has resulted in them competing for space for their daily activities like fish landing, boat parking, net mending, and even housing with the port and its infrastructure development on the landward side, and competing with larger shipping vessels for navigation space and access to certain parts of Vasco bay. It was in this backdrop, that a community led groundtruthing study was initiated in April 2018 by Old Cross Fishing Canoe Owners Co-op Society Ltd, Baina Ramponkar, Fishing Canoe Owners Society, Destierro Fisherman Association – Vasco, Goenchea Raponkarancho Ekvott (GRE) and the Centre for Policy Research (CPR)-Namati Environmental Justice Program with support from concerned citizens of Vasco and the Federation of Rainbow Warriors.This groundtruthing study is also an attempt by the affected community members to understand the environmental impacts of these berths, link them to the regulatory requirements and then push for compliance of the same.
Topic:
Environment, Law Enforcement, Law, and Regulation
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

85. Building Regulations For Faecal Sludge Management: Review of Building Regulations From Indian States

Author:
Arkaja Singh
Publication Date:
12-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
Getting approvals under the various building regulations applicable to any particular jurisdiction is often the first step in construction and development. The Report ‘Building Regulations for Faecal Sludge Management: Review of Building Regulations from Indian States’ seeks to understand how these building regulations address on-site sanitation, what kind of standards do they impose on developers, and how well do they incorporate mechanisms to enforce these standards. In this report, we look at six states: Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, and Uttar Pradesh. We also look at other standards that are applicable to on-site containment of Faecal sludge, and the manner in which these standards get incorporated into the building regulations. We find that context-specific attention to On-Site Containment of Faecal Sludge is only given in very few states, at least within our sample size. Usually, Building Regulations seem to rely on already existing standards such as the National Building Code, 2016. Additionally, the inconsistencies within the bye-laws exhibit a lack of understanding on the issue of FSM, amongst the policy-makers. As Faecal Sludge Management is an issue at the interface of environment, sanitation, and public health, a lack of convergence between various departments of the government is also noticed.
Topic:
Environment, Government, Health, Regulation, and Sanitation
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

86. India: Using open school data to improve transparency and accountability

Author:
Mridusmita Bordoloi and Varun Kapoor
Publication Date:
10-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
This study collates experiences of users of data at different levels to understand the bottlenecks and challenges to achieve transparency and accountability in India’s public education system. Detailed field surveys of parents and head teachers in government schools were conducted in three districts in three different states of India.
Topic:
Education, Government, Children, Youth, Accountability, and Transparency
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

87. Ethnography of Sanitation in Small Towns: A Study of Angul and Dhenkanal, Odisha

Author:
Ranjita Mohanty and Anju Dwivedi
Publication Date:
09-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
In the current sanitation policy discourse, cultural norms of purity and pollution are considered as major obstacles to toilet behaviour leading emphasis on behavioural change to orient people to use toilets. This study conducted in 21 slums in Angul and Dhenkanal, two small towns in Odisha, explores the sociocultural norms, behaviour and practices that influence sanitation in small towns. The study shows that culture doesn’t operate in isolation. Cultural interacts with multiple factors such as physical space in urban areas, resources people have to invest in toilet, essential infrastructure such as water, and cost effective technology that people can access. Culture influences these aspects of sanitation as well as gets influenced by them. The study highlights that people adapt in various degrees to their physical environment, thus compromising on cultural norms and beliefs but there are certain non-negotiable norms that are not compromised. This calls for decoding the cultural determinants of sanitation. The study suggest that for effective governance of sanitation, policies need to take the above mentioned factors into consideration, and create scope for understanding how culture works in a particular context and influences sanitation behaviour, choices, and practices of the poor. The study was conducted by the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, under the Scaling City Institutions for India (SCI-FI) Project on Urban Sanitation, supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Topic:
Social Policy, Ethnography, Urban, Sanitation, and Pollution
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

88. Training Manual on Non-Sewered Urban Sanitation

Author:
Shubhagato Dasgupta, Anju Dwivedi, Ambarish Karunanithi, Swati Dhiman, Deepti Raj, and Neha Agarwal
Publication Date:
09-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
Odisha, while being among the relatively less urbanized states in the country, has registered a significantly high decadal urban growth rate of 27%, with the urban population growing from 37 million to 42 million during the decade 2001-2011. With the addition of small towns in the Census, the Government of Odisha has committed itself to address the challenges of poor sanitation and inadequate infrastructure related to sanitation in urban areas. The Government of Odisha has undertaken significant efforts towards improving urban sanitation in Odisha. As part of this effort, large-scale underground sewerage projects are being implemented in major cities. Keeping in view the challenges in executing underground sewerage projects and the high cost implications, over the last two years Housing and Urban Development Department, Government of Odisha with support of Scaling City Institutions for India: Sanitation (SCI-FI) team at the Centre for Policy Research have engaged in finding appropriate lower-cost, more easily implementable solutions for city-wide environmental sanitation in two small towns (Angul and Dhenkanal) and AMRUT Cities. The Odisha Urban Sanitation Policy and the Odisha Urban Sanitation Strategy released in late 2016 supported by Scaling City Institutions for India: Sanitation (SCI-FI) team at the Centre for Policy Research lay out the state strategy for sanitation emphasizing alternative solutions. This strategy is under active implementation currently and will ensure improved sanitation across our secondary and smaller cities. The ‘Training Manual for Non-Sewered Urban Sanitation’ was developed by the Scaling City Institutions for India: Sanitation (SCI-FI) team at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, with the able support of the Housing and Urban Development Department, Government of Odisha. This training manual is an essential instrument for furthering the goals of the Odisha Urban Sanitation Policy. It adapts most recent developments from across the globe, translating the lessons to make the training modules relevant in the context of Odisha. The subsections include: Module 1: Sanitation and Its Relevance; Module 2: Sanitation Flow Diagram; Module 3: Institutional and Policy Framework for Waste Water Management; Module 4: Urban Waste Water Management Systems; Module 5: Introduction to Faecal Sludge Management; Module 6: Containment and Handling of Faecal Sludge; Module 7: Treatment and Re-use/ Disposal of Faecal Sludge; Module 8: Operation and Maintenance of Faecal Sludge Treatment Plant; Module 9: Financial Management; Module 10: Community Engagement in Faecal Sludge Management; Module 11: Planning of Faecal Sludge Management System. This manual shall be a good resource to train all officials and other stakeholders involved in local service delivery to achieve the Odisha Urban Sanitation Policy targets.
Topic:
Government, Training, Urban, and Sanitation
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

89. Note on Faecal Sludge Management in Rural India: Graded Solution, legal and Regulatory implications and Possible Administrative Structure

Author:
Arkaja Singh and Anindita Mukherjee
Publication Date:
08-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
Rural areas in India are experiencing significant gains in toilet coverage under the public funded programmes. Given the rate of ‘in-situ urbanization’ in a growing urban paradigm,the rural areas, in many parts, seems to emulate urban infrastructural preferences for their toilets. This may remain annulled due to non-availability of urban like service facilities in the rural context. The first part of the report focusses on establishes the urbanising characteristics of the Large and Dense Villages (LDVs) in India for usage of a specific typology of Sanitation Infrastructure which in turn links to the gaps in terms of service availability across the Faecal Sludge Management (FSM) value chain. In this context, in the second half of the report, the authors examine the various environmental and municipal laws applicable to Sanitation in rural areas. The report also sheds light on how the capacities of various institutions and legal instruments may be leveraged for graded interventions, ensuring safe and sustainable sanitation in rural areas in India.
Topic:
Development, Government, Urbanization, Sanitation, and Services
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia

90. An Overview of the Smart Cities Mission in India

Author:
Ashwathy Anand, Ajai Sreevatsan, and Persis Taraporevala
Publication Date:
08-2018
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
The newly elected federal Government of India (GoI) launched the Smart Cities Mission (SCM) in 2015 with the stated purpose of improving the governance and infrastructural deficiencies that plague Indian cities. The Mission categorically states that there is no one definition of a 'smart city' and implies infinite liberty for cities to self-define their understanding of 'smartness'. Towards demystifying the Mission, the researchers utilised government documentation from the 99 cities to answer one question-What constitutes a smart city in India.
Topic:
Development, Government, Urbanization, and Social Policy
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, and Asia