Fixing our cities is one of the most complex challenges of the 21st century, said experts gathered at the Dasra Philanthropy Week on Friday to discuss India’s urban crisis.
Shrikant Vishwanathan, chief executive of Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy, said a city is a unit of life and therefore a unit of governance and of the economy, much like the State or the country as a whole. “Therefore a political and an administrative system are needed to govern the city, like you have one for the State or the Centre. But today we do not have a system of political leadership or a system of administrative leadership for a city. So we do not treat a city as a unit of governance or the economy.”
Mr. Vishwanathan said this lies at the heart of India’s urban challenges. “It’s a problem with the system’s thinking. You are not thinking of the city as a system and as a place but as an aggregation of sectors,” he said, adding, “We have been very slow in recognising the gravity of the problem.”
K. Padmanabhaiah of Administrative Staff College of India said the city administrations are in a mess. “It gets worse if the municipal corporation is run by a party, which is not the ruling party.”
He said a municipality essentially has three main functions — regulation, big project development, and proving services like clean water and waste disposal. “Unfortunately, all the focus is on the first two functions because they involve more power. Very little attention is given to services,” he said, suggesting the services arm be separated with a special focus.
Sakshi Gudwani from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation highlighted how a lot of investment goes into bigger cities while smaller cities, which are resource-starved, yet remain ignored.
