The Hindu Business Line : Development blues in Urban India

Assessment reports filed with the Urban Development Ministry stress that the enforcement of traffic rules and regulations require greater attention in the metros.

Indu Rayadurgam

Cities have emerged as the backbone of economies all over the world, with their higher contributions to overall employment and growth. There are many factors that determine urban competitiveness, both at the national and the international levels. The interplay of structural economic changes and geo-political developments, combined with domestic economic policy changes, sectoral contributions to growth and demographic changes determine the competitiveness of urban areas in any country.

A recent Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report on urban competitiveness for various regions lists out factors such as policy integration, public-private co-operation, human and capital development for the success of urban areas. In India, cities such as Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai, Chandigarh, and Delhi, have emerged as vital centres of economic growth.

These cities have exploited their human capital and business potential in order to gain domestic and foreign investments. But the infrastructure, quality of life, law enforcements, and civic discipline in these cities have a long way to meet even minimum standards, especially when compared to a city-state like Singapore.

Recently, Singapore’s Minister Mentor, Mr Lee Kuan Yew, stated that corruption-free governance, a sound legal framework and judiciary have helped propel Singapore to become one of the most efficient places in Asia. These are the very factors that are incomplete in the Indian urban milieu. A comparison between Singapore and India might not be appropriate due to various factors but invaluable lessons can be drawn from the experience of the island-state.

Communication gap

The communication gap between administrative mechanisms and end-users is very evident in India, especially when it comes to transportation policies and their implementation in urban areas. The statements made some time ago by the Delhi Chief Minister about people not following rules when crossing roads, as a response to another accident involving the ‘killer’ Blue Line buses, comes across as a last-ditch attempt to defend the inefficient public transport links in the Capital.

The issue now is not to demand the stoppage of the privately-operated Blue Line buses but to enforce stricter regulations to make them safe and effective. Suspension of these CNG-operated buses would prove costly for commuters and the government. Traffic management and the Blue Line buses were stated as the top priority of Delhi’s Police Chief, Y. S. Dadwal, in July 2007. But the long list of mishaps involving these buses reveal a structureless owner-contractor operation mechanism with no accountability-responsibility hierarchy in place.

The Indian Urban Development Minister, Mr Jaipal Reddy, released the “FICCI-Ernst and Young Indian Real Estate Report, 2007: Growth and New Destinations” in September 2007 , in which Delhi, followed by Greater Mumbai, emerged as the top two cities among 48 Indian cities. These rankings were based on 57 parameters, including health, infrastructure, transportation system, and the contribution of labour force to the economic growth.

In the Urban Governance Index, Navi Mumbai emerged as the top city, followed by Delhi. It is true that Delhi has witnessed improvements in its infrastructure set-up over the past few years. In spite of this, many cases of law and order failure in the major Indian cities are reported frequently, with Delhi and Mumbai being the most frequent offenders.

Best practices

The most important issues that have come to the forefront are the condition and the management of cities in India. The decentralisation of urban governance and management, introduced in the early 1990s, led to the introduction of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) by the Indian government in 2005.

It was meant to generate a reform-based mechanism for States through the implementation of best practices in the development of urban centres and the decentralisation of funds to municipal offices by the states. Based on the official reports filed by the Ministry of Urban Development, the appraisal process of the City Development Plans has been carried out by the nominated institutions, including the National Institute of Urban Affairs and the Indian Institute of Management.

In the assessment mechanism for the allocation of funds, the factors under the category of urban transport that should require greater attention are the implementation of traffic rules and regulations, and the contribution of the Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) to improve the moral standards of people and, most importantly, of the administrative police.

Inculcating discipline

The expansion of road width and augmentation of pedestrian facilities are very important factors. But the responsibility of the government to inculcate a sense of discipline in people should be included in the process of assessment. Increasing parking spaces or improving energy efficiency is important but guiding the people to use the facilities allotted is even more important.

It is not a comforting sight to witness policemen in uniform not respecting the traffic rules. Neither is it good to see educated middle-class Indians doing the same. The rules are in place but they are not implemented by both administrators and end-users in the strict manner that they should be. The vital link is really a two-way communication process. Governance has to be effective in order to evoke sufficient response from the citizens, even if it involves strict authoritarian measures. The priority here should be to ensure efficient, rule-based, inclusive governance rather than perpetuate vote-bank politics.

The Central government uses its State counterparts which, in turn, use the decentralised structure to disperse functions and finances. The functions, responsibility and accountability mechanisms allotted to the ULBs and their rural counterparts should be communicated to the people.

This is a necessary function of any democracy. Neither the government nor the people can independently be held accountable for the fault-lines in a nation’s functioning. Also, public-private partnerships are important for the development of adequate infrastructure facilities but the failure to regulate private operators will definitely cause many problems for the government and the public.

Motivating factors

Recently, Indian States competed with each other to reward players of the Indian cricket team after a cricket World Cup victory. However, when it comes to competition to implement developmental issues, primary health-care, water/sanitation, schooling and local economic development, it is difficult to find such an attitude among States. According to the Constitution, urban issues and education are both under state jurisdiction, with the Central government playing only an advisory role. If States can produce a cricketer to represent a World Cup winning squad, is it not possible for them to put in place effective enforcement mechanisms for the citizenry?

Many motivating factors for improvement are available from elsewhere; notable among them are the urban greening schemes in Singapore and Malaysia, the decentralised participation of municipalities in Bulgaria, and the Singapore fine system for non-obeying of rules and regulations.

Lessons drawn from a few success stories may be the recipe for corruption-free governance, an effective legal system and inculcation of civic discipline, which, in turn, would pave the way for the sustainable design of a noteworthy urban environment.

What is needed in India is a holistic approach with combined efforts by the urban local bodies and citizens groups, with support from the Central and State governments. This is, no doubt, a mammoth task. However, it will become an even bigger challenge, if not addressed now.

Furthermore, it is a vitally important task if India wants to seriously stake its claim to being one of the leading economic players in the international arena.

(The author is a Research Associate at the Institute of South Asian Studies, Singapore.)