Trends In Growth of Urban Population

Highlights From Census Of India 2011

By Dr C Chandramouli, PPT Presentation
Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India
15th March 2013

Procedure for Identifying Urban Areas:

  1. Prior to Census an elaborate exercise is undertaken to identify Urban Areas
  2. Updated list of villages and towns prepared after incorporating the jurisdictional changes that have taken place after 2001 Census and up to 31st December 2009
  3. Identification of Census Towns carried out by applying the urban criteria to all villages including Census Towns and Out Growths of Census 2001
  4. The Census Towns are not declassified if they fail to meet the criteria on the basis of Census 2011.

Housing Stock, Amenities & Assets in Slums – Census 2011

by Dr C. Chandramouli, a PPT presentation

Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India

“In all 1.73 crore census houses have been reported in houselisting blocks, categorised as slums in India, comprising 1.37 crore slum households.

In 19 cities with million-plus population, 25 per cent of households live in slums.

A majority-71 per cent- of these are located in six states of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.

90 per cent of slum households use electricity, 70 per cent slum households have television, 72.7 per cent have telephone facility while 10.4 per cent households have computer or laptop in their house.

In 2001, there were 23.5 per cent of households in urban areas which were living in slums. It has now come down to 17.4 per cent. But there are still 17.35 million slum houses, 13.74 million slum households and we have 68 million people living in the slum areas as 2011 census.

 

Rural-Urban Dynamics, poverty and smaller towns

Global Monitoring Report 2013:  Rural-Urban Dynamics and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

 Key message of the GMR 2013:

In the past two decades, developing countries have urbanized rapidly, with the number of people living in urban settlements rising from about 1.5 billion in 1990 to 3.6 billion (more than half of the world’s population) in 2011. The report finds that urban poverty rates are significantly lower than rural poverty rates and that urban populations have far better access to the basic public services, such as access to safe water and sanitation facilities, even though within urban areas asymmetries in access are large. If the forces of urbanization are not managed speedily and efficiently, slum growth can overwhelm city growth, exacerbate urban poverty, and derail MDG achievements. As the GMR points out, however, people are located along a continuous rural-urban spectrum, and large cities are not necessarily places where the urban poor are concentrated. Smaller towns matter greatly for urban poverty reduction and service delivery. GMR 2013 calls for an integrated strategy to better manage the planning – connecting – financing formula of urbanization.

Panchayati raj: Failing the urbanization test

Lack of decentralization means municipalities lack power, resources to meet rising aspirations of ‘middle’ India.

An article of Live Mint, Tue, Apr 30 2013, by  Elizabeth Roche  |  Liz Mathew   |  Shamsheer Yousaf.

“A corporation is difficult to deal with,” Hamid says. “There is a long procedure to get projects sanctioned. And then, you have to give bribes for projects that you want to undertake to various officials in the hierarchy. It’s only 35 paise out of every rupee that gets spent for the people and development, 65 paise goes as bribes. It is just a whole lot of trouble to be a part of the corporation.”
In contrast, a panchayat president is better empowered to do things for his people, says Hamid. “There is also a direct interface with the people, this is a very important position.”
Both Othakadai and Silaiman are listed as so-called census towns by the Tamil Nadu census commission website. By definition, they are populous areas—in between officially urban and rural India— where farming has been replaced by other professions or businesses as the main source of livelihood.
And Tamil Nadu is one among six states that have seen a proliferation of census towns, putting pressure on infrastructure and civic amenities. Other states where census towns have proliferated include West Bengal, Kerala, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh.
“Tamil Nadu is most urbanized state in India, according to the 2011 census,” says Karen Coelho, assistant professor for urban governance and reforms at the Madras Institute for Development Studies. “With 44% urbanization, Tamil Nadu has beaten Maharashtra which was at the top in 2001.”

 

The devolution deficit

By KC Sivaramakrishnan (CPR)

The Indian Express, Wed May 01 2013

Why we need to revisit the 74th Amendment

The National Panchayati Raj Day to mark the enactment of the 73rd Constitutional Amendment was observed on April 24 with due ceremony but little hype. Whatever the reasons for the celebration, even those are not available for the 74th Amendment dealing with municipalities.

Power of the rurban

An article of  The Indian Express, Mon Apr 22 2013

The fast expanding grey area between India’s urban and rural segments — you could call it semi-rural or rurban — is increasingly determining the shape of India’s democracy as well as market economy. This aspirational segment has grown faster than you could imagine and the people here are consuming and voting robustly. The 2009 National Election Study by CSDS found that the much touted “urban voter apathy” was a misnomer in the semi-rural areas with urban characteristics. This segment not only recorded, on average, 10 per cent higher voting than metros like Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and Bangalore, it also saw higher voting than the rural constituencies.

Rural-Urban Dynamics and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

Global Monitoring Report 2013:  Rural-Urban Dynamics and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

Friday, May 3, 2013
02:00 – 04:00 PM 
Room No.  HT- 1-300
The World Bank, Hindustan Times Building, Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi
Presenter :
Jos Verbeek, Lead Author, Global Monitoring Report, World Bank

Discussants:  
Arun Maira, Member, Planning Commission, Government of India 
A S Bahl, Economic Advisor, Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India 
Dr. Amitabh KunduProfessor of Economics & Dean of School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi
Aromar Revi, Director, Indian Institute of Human Settlements                

Moderator : 
Barjor Mehta,  Lead Urban Specialist, World Bank

Please disseminate to your external audiences 

For more information on the Global Monitoring Report, go to www.worldbank.org/gmr

(only for World Bank Staff)
Others please confirm through an email

      Key message of the GMR 2013:

In the past two decades, developing countries have urbanized rapidly, with the number of people living in urban settlements rising from about 1.5 billion in 1990 to 3.6 billion (more than half of the world’s population) in 2011. The report finds that urban poverty rates are significantly lower than rural poverty rates and that urban populations have far better access to the basic public services, such as access to safe water and sanitation facilities, even though within urban areas asymmetries in access are large. If the forces of urbanization are not managed speedily and efficiently, slum growth can overwhelm city growth, exacerbate urban poverty, and derail MDG achievements. As the GMR points out, however, people are located along a continuous rural-urban spectrum, and large cities are not necessarily places where the urban poor are concentrated. Smaller towns matter greatly for urban poverty reduction and service delivery. GMR 2013 calls for an integrated strategy to better manage the planning – connecting – financing formula of urbanization.