In the last few decades, Tamil Nadu, the most urbanised among the major States, has lost its political vision in city planning. Housing policies and urban planning have been presented as a techno-bureaucratic exercise, preventing the political leadership from taking ownership and responsibility. In the process, the citizens find their needs unrepresented. With large urban projects on the anvil and the third master plan for Chennai on the drawing board, it is time for the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) government to repoliticise planning and adopt a vision consistent with its people-friendly promises.
Planning of the past and present
For long, the State government stood apart with its innovative planning practices. In 1948, it produced a comprehensive housing report and impressive solutions for the housing shortage. As early as the 1960s, it created a comprehensive plan for Chennai. It set up the Slum Clearance Board in 1971, the first of its kind in India. The then DMK government adopted a radical policy to make the State slum-free. The iconic photograph of then Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi taking a boat ride in the rejuvenated Cooum is a telling example of how urban development projects remained an essential part of the political agenda. Former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa supported solar-powered greenhouse schemes for the rural poor. State leadership directly associated itself with planning policies, and building liveable cities was central to political action.
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What changed over time? First, policymakers depoliticised planning and presented it as a mere technical exercise of allocating resources such as land and money. They deployed what political scientists Matthew Flinders and Jim Buller describe as ‘institutional and preference-shaping tactics’ to achieve this. Institutions were created to give experts a longer rope, reduce political interference, and avoid short-term considerations in planning. However, they are meant to function within the parameters set by the elected political leadership. This appears increasingly absent in Tamil Nadu.
As Flinders and Buller point out, using the ‘preference-shaping tactic’, institutions create a choiceless situation by offering the opinions of experts as the only solution. They exclude contesting views from public discussion. There is no political moderation of expert-driven agendas. While theorists may argue that depoliticisation improves efficiency, on the ground, as planning and policies keep failing, the credibility of politicians erodes significantly.
A telling example of depoliticised planning is the Tamil Nadu Affordable Urban Housing and Habitat Policy, 2020. It thrives on ambiguity and opaqueness. It has reduced state role and allows the market to take care of low-income housing without providing any information on shortage, household incomes, and affordable housing prices. It remains silent on the numbers of households that cannot afford the housing supplied by the market. On the contrary, early plans, such as the 1948 report, offered empirical evidence, transparent assessment, and a clear political agenda. That report acknowledged that 75% of the population in Chennai belonged to the low-income group with an income of ₹50 or less a month. These families could not afford houses built by the market at the cost of ₹5,000. The government then took full charge of providing housing for lower-income households. Similarly, in 1971, the government admitted that the Housing Board had failed to deliver since it had diluted its mission by focusing on higher-income groups. The government created a separate board and invested its resources in low-income housing.
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In contrast, current policies do not disclose the conditions of housing and cities. They do not clearly commit to keeping the sale price of low-income housing within the affordable range in private projects that avail themselves of financial support from state-supported shelter funds. The case of the third master plan for Chennai appears no different. The activities have commenced without any political framework. Will the government agree if the planners again propose a market mechanism to allocate land use and resources? What outcomes do they want the plans to achieve?
The way forward
As economist Allan Drazen explains, the government must acknowledge the divergent sets of interests and choose the mechanism to negotiate them. Only political leadership can offer a widely accepted framework. The government must take ownership and ensure specific outcomes. The possibilities are merging the Housing Board, which increasingly functions as a developer, with the Slum Board; pooling all land and resources and using them only for low-income housing; enforcing wider consultation; moving away from conventional land use planning; and adopting strategic urban design projects to make spaces for people and safe streets.
A. Srivathsan is a Professor at CEPT University. Views are personal