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.