As Ms Selija has noted, PURA is a design that resolves all these problems in a simple and cost-effective manner but only in the case of new settlements. Unfortunately, few have cared to study PURA's basic concepts with the result that most schemes of PURA miss both the financial and environmental benefits that it can provide.

For the record, PURA is a habitat developed within walking distance of a ring road and linking enough villages to connect a minimum of 30,000 people. That means that all points in PURA are also within walking distance of wide open fields. Hence, there is ample scope for local waste disposal without carting garbage over long distances the way one is compelled to do in large cities. Water harvesting also becomes easy to implement.

As an additional benefit, the ring design inherently distributes business instead of concentrating it in a compact Central Business District. For that reason, it becomes a simple matter to provide housing close to the workplace and thereby all but eliminate daily commuting to work. For all these reasons, PURA is economical both in capital and running costs making it self-financing and bankable.

Several village groups have formally given an undertaking to hand over nearly 3000 hectares each for establishing a PURA. Some investors have seen a business opportunity in the idea and are willing to develop PURAs on their own and give a binding undertaking to maintain stipulated environmental quality. They do not want any grant whatever from the government but merely want PURA declared an infrastructure project. That is where the matter stands. Most advantages of PURA will be lost if the population exceeds three or at most five lakh. Further, the principles of PURA are not usable in existing cities. It is also not possible to make existing cities self-sufficient in water; they will continue to depend on imports of water from long distances. Yet, it is not impossible to evolve a strategy to meet the remaining three objectives of zero slums, efficient waste disposal and minimal commuting to work. The goal will not be reached overnight but the move can be accelerated if all new constructions meet these three objectives.

Symptoms of disease

Slums, filth and long hours of commuting are symptoms and not the disease itself. Excessive allocation of space for commerce is the true underlying disease. Excluding utilities and industries (they need individual case by case approach), trouble starts once commerce takes up more than a fifth of built up space. Excessive demand from commerce is a triple hazard: One, it reduces space for residents; two, it raises prices to the roof; three, it creates more jobs exacerbating the pressure on space and thereby raising real estate prices even more.

Then, instead of drawing elaborate rules and regulation, it will suffice if it is ensured that every new building (or a cluster of buildings) allocates not more than a tenth of its carpet area to the use of business. That will effectively guarantee enough residential space for all employees and close by too. Reserving another one-tenth of built-up space for the poor will check further any tendency of slums to form.

Two more stipulations are in order: One, no building (or cluster of them) should send out untreated sewage and biodegradable waste. Two, every building must have adequate parking space (or park and ride facility). Technology is available for local, decentralised treatment of both sewage and biodegradable waste and it is not expensive. Treated sewage and biodegradable wastes can even be marketed and earn enough to make the exercise self-supporting.

With barely a million cars, our cities have already become impassable. Heaven knows what the situation would be if the numbers swell the way they have in East Asia, let alone in the West. Roadside is not the proper place to store cars when not in use. NURM will find itself in a mess if it does not make provision for future growth in vehicles. Vehicle parking problem can be tackled either by building multi-storey car parks or by minimising the need for car travel. The latter option is superior. In that case, bus stops should be within walking distance of every building. It will help even more if buses get dedicated fast lanes. That is not easy to implement in existing cities, but by copying the way Mr Chandrababu Naidu widened the streets of Hyderabad, it can be done. These different strategies for existing settlements and for new ones will work best if they are linked to the relaxations of urban regulations. For instance, the Rent Control Act, relief from Urban Land Ceiling and low Stamp Duty should be made applicable only where the construction satisfies the following rules:

All four rules involve design practice and may be checked at the construction stage itself. They do not require daily or even frequent inspection. Contravention at any time can be easily detected. Hence, these rules are simple to understand and easy to enforce.

Limit the options

It is equally important that existing buildings do not get the benefit of relaxed urban regulations. Then, builders will have a choice: Stay with old polluting practices and suffer as now from urban restrictions. Or, improve as desired and enjoy the benefits of helpful laws. Without this differentiation, builders will be tempted to misuse the relaxed laws; older cities may not improve as desired. The Prime Minister has referred to the poor state of municipal finances. Often, the municipalities themselves are to blame for their predicament: It is not unknown for municipalities to allocate as much as 80 per cent of the budget for salaries and establishment. Potholes are not due to lack of funds but due to poor engineering and poorer governance. If the Centre were wise, it will combine large grants with fiscal discipline.

Ideally, employers should be made to provide civic services at their own expense (as in the City of London) with municipalities confining themselves to regulatory functions. If that is not acceptable, at the least municipal service departments should be made financially and administratively autonomous with municipal authorities once again restricting themselves to regulatory functions. NURM will stand or fall depending on the quality of municipal oversight — a factor that requires due consideration.

(The author is a former Director of IIT Madras. Response may be sent to: indiresan@gmail.com)

(This is 164th in the Vision 2020 series. The previous article was published on November 28.)

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