The Hindu Business Line : Making cities of villages

What slums need most is a halt to further immigration. What villagers need most are export-oriented programmes such as SEZs. Neither will happen until villages get urban amenities and become as attractive as the cities. The solution to the three problems is PURA, says P. V. INDIRESAN.

In the previous article, I talked about Mumbai's plans to revamp its biggest slum Dharavi. As I am writing this one, reports are coming in of Mumbai politicians threatening outsiders, of villagers killed in their agitation against the SEZ in Nandigram, and of policemen killed by Naxalites in Chattisgarh. Chauvinist Mumbai politicians, agitations against SEZ and Naxalite violence are not separate diseases; they are the symptoms of one and the same disease — intolerable rural-urban disparity.

If rural-urban disparity had beenwithin acceptable limits, would outsiders have migrated to Mumbai? Would villagers have lost faith in government plans for SEZ? Or, would Naxalites have an excuse for violence?

Let us assume that Dharavi is cleaned up. Then, its refurbished apartments will become attractive to many outsiders who would be willing to pay lakhs of rupees to get them. Current residents will be tempted to sell their allotments and start new slums. Villagers from far and wide will also be tempted to migrate — to create more slums. The Dharavi scheme is like filling a bucket with a big hole in the bottom.

Jobs in Villages

The true cure to our three problems is to create more and better jobs in the villages of Bihar, UP, Tamil Nadu and wherever. The Government does have a national scheme of rural employment guarantee. Unfortunately, it does not create jobs as attractive as the ones in Mumbai and in other large cities. The Government has also launched the ambitious Bharat Nirman programme to improve the rural condition. Unfortunately, it too has one fatal flaw.

Economically, only forest dwellers are totally self reliant. When a village becomes more prosperous, it becomes less self-reliant. It starts consuming more and more goods and services that cannot be made locally and have to be brought from outside. To pay for such purchases, the village should produce and sell outside an equivalent value of goods and services — it requires larger and larger export businesses. Neither Bharat Nirman nor any other rural development scheme makes provision for such businesses. They keep commerce at the most basic level; effectively choke it. Therefore, like a person with blocked arteries, villages are liable to suffer debilitating stroke.

Disparity is Inevitable

There are many who take the view that urban growth is so natural that rural-urban disparity is not only inevitable, it is even desirable. They contend that there is no point in bucking the trend. For instance, Delhi plans to increase its population by a crore or even more. But makers of such policy do not ask: Which is better, take jobs to where people are, or make people migrate?

India has no need to have slums. It is less densely populated than England, Japan, Holland and several other countries. If those nations have avoided slums, we should be able to do the same.

Currently, there are about a 100 million families living in city slums. The Dharavi Plan aims to provide each such family 225 sq ft of space. Let us double it. Let us add an equal area for public purposes. Even with such generous design, ten thousand families can be comfortably accommodated in a square kilometre. The entire current slum population of the country will then need 10,000 sq km, no more than 0.3 per cent of the country's land area.

Even after doubling the space allocation planned in the Dharavi scheme, we will still have 99.7 per cent of the country's land area to do whatever else we want. Therefore, the problem is not lack of space but our propensity to put all eggs in a few cities.

Not Village-focussed

We do not have as yet a systematic plan for distributing our investments equitably.

People will cite recent troubles in Nandigram and Singur as reason enough not to shift investment to rural areas. They forget that villagers are not objecting to development but to the way it is being implemented. Villagers are angry because they feel Special Economic Zones have been designed for the benefit of industrialists, that they do not focus on the needs of villagers.

Even in cities like Mumbai, the organised sector employs barely a fifth of the population. In other words, by a natural process of economic osmosis, three-four jobs emerge in informal businesses for every job created in the organised sector. A wise planner will make space for such expansion. SEZs have no such plans.

Further, when industries create jobs, services create many more. Services multiply the employment industry creates. A wise planner will leave enough scope for services to flourish. SEZs have no such plans.

We are having the worst of urban development in the form of unsustainable slum improvement. We are also having the worst of rural development in the form of ill-designed SEZs. We have made a mess in both because we have not asked what the people want; only what we want for ourselves.

Reasons Explained

Suppose the government had gone to Singur, Nandigram or wherever with detailed plans to provide villagers with excellent schools, hospitals, roads, transport services, protected running water, sanitation, modern housing and all other conveniences of urban living.

Suppose the government had explained to the villagers that most of these amenities — textbooks and computers for schools, medicines and equipment for hospitals, inputs for other services etc. — cannot be produced within the village but will have to be imported from outside.

Suppose the government had explained that they cannot buy those goods unless their villages produce and sell an equivalent value of goods. Further, suppose it had been pointed out to them that no amount of farm products can pay for modern schools, hospitals, and all such amenities.

Suppose the government had explained that for that reason, and only that, it is bringing in new industry, and that the taxes the industry pays will be used for developing their villages. Then, would the villagers have been as obstructive and as violent as they have been? If the villagers had cooperated, and many more SEZs would have come into operation, would villagers migrate to Mumbai and other cities? Would Naxalites have a case for their violence?

The government operates in watertight compartments. Neither the Rural Development nor the Urban Development Ministry has any say in the way SEZs are designed. Though every major proposal is supposed to pass through a Committee of Secretaries, there is really no one in the government who operates holistically. The Commerce Ministry cannot, will not, look at social services in rural areas. The Rural Development Ministry cannot, will not, look at modern industry in rural areas. The Urban Development Ministry cannot, will not, look at land use plan in rural areas. Each Ministry guards its own turf so carefully that little synergy emerges.

We need a concerted approach. Neither slum rehabilitation nor the troubles in Nandigram can be resolved by any single ministry acting in isolation. The problem is multi-dimensional. Unfortunately, we have no administrative mechanism to tackle multi-dimensional problems.

What our slums need most is a halt to further immigration. What our villagers need most are export-oriented programmes such as SEZ. Neither will happen, nor will Naxalite violence abate until villages get urban amenities, and become as attractive as the cities. The solution to the three problems is PURA.

(To be concluded)

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

(This is 196th in the Vision 2020 series. The previous article was published on March 5.)

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