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The paper engages with the water economies of Bodh Gaya, a small but prominent Buddhist town located in Bihar, India. We analysed the water economies using the neo-Polanyian idea of instituted economic processes. The anthropological approach to water economies helps us explain how drinking water has been produced, distributed, appropriated, and consumed in Bodh Gaya over the last seven decades. The paper argues that the centralised grid-based water supply system, which aims to provide universal access to drinking water to the whole town, has failed to develop. Water as a universal public good was never established in Bodh Gaya. Water was produced, distributed, appropriated and consumed in diverse ways by different groups of individuals and communities. Water remained a community-owned resource, a private, semi-public good, and recently, a commodity, but not purely a public good. Instead of relying on the ideals of centralised grid-based water supply networks to make water available for the whole populace, a more decentralised and hybrid service delivery institutions are needed to reach the diverse local population. The decentralised public water provisioning systems must be supported through appropriate regulatory measures and participatory planning initiatives to make it socially just and environmentally benign. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper empirically examines the applicability of the planetary urbanization concept to understand the complexities associated with the rural-to-urban transformation process unfolding in India. It contributes to the rural-urban debate by investigating the role of non-urban spaces – here census towns – in accelerating India's process of urbanization. The Capital Region of India is taken as a study area and a mixed methods approach is used to establish concentrated and extended urbanization as interlinked processes in relation to the growth of census towns. The applied mixed methods approach helps to overcome the critiques of deploying Global North theories, here planetary urbanization, on the Global South context by not only establishing a general pattern and dynamics of growth but also by contextualizing the local characteristics of rural to urban transformation as census towns. The analysis established a dense network of transport and a high level of commuting for work between statutory towns and census towns in the urban periphery and hinterland overcoming the traditional urban and rural divide. This paper makes a methodological and analytical contribution to the concept of planetary urbanization, whereby growth of census towns can be explained as an interlinked process of concentrated, extended and differential urbanization. The political economy analyses established that the differences between statutory and census towns can be traced back to state rescaling and investment policies. In this process, rural areas are rapidly acquiring urban characteristics as census towns and to some extent perform better on socioeconomic and infrastructural aspects compared to statutory towns (official urban areas). • Concept of planetary urbanization applied to India's rural to urban transformation. • Concentrated and extended urbanization established as interlinked processes. • Rural areas are rapidly acquiring urban characteristics as census towns. • Mixed methods help overcome the critique of planetary urbanization concept. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While neoliberalisation has long drawn scholarly attention, there have been few attempts to quantify the course of restructuring under neoliberal urbanisation. This paper aims to describe and quantify the restructuring process in India for the period 1991–2011. Theoretically embedded in the notion of "creative destruction", the paper adopts a multi-method approach to better discern the interjurisdictional differences of the restructuring process. This research contributes to the urban debate by statistically measuring and distinguishing restructuring process between urban and rural areas using creative destruction moments as well as by underscoring the need for an integrated analysis of rural and urban areas for addressing spatial disparities. • Concept of creative destruction is applied to India. • Multi-method approach is operationalized across space and time. • Neoliberal restructuring is measured by a set of destructive and creative moments. • Features of the restructuring process in urban and rural areas are discerned. • Integrated analysis of rural and urban areas is recommended to curtail disparities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The housing dimension in Kolkata has been changing in recent years. Since 1991, the city has initiated housing reform that has taken many forms and manifestations characterized by the reduction in social allocation, cutbacks in public funding and promotion of a real estate culture in close partnership between the state and private actors. There has been increasing concern about the housing condition of the poor in the deserted slums and bustee settlements amidst the evident ‘poor blindness’ in housing and investment policies. Against this background the paper discusses self-help housing in Kolkata. It seeks to answer a simple question – why the concept of self-help has not been recognised as a viable policy option for a city with widespread slums and bustee settlements by visiting the complex urban context of Kolkata set within the city''s politics, poverty and policies. The paper concludes that there is a need to recognise the existing structural duality in the city and support self-help housing as a parallel housing approach. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper is concerned with two questions: When and how does society at large (through State, intermediary organisations, labour unions, etc.) institute a set of supports to minimise schisms in the labour market?; How exactly do these schisms evolve in response to changing technical standards in industrial production and services many of which are increasingly globally regulated? This paper attempts to sketch some phenomenological features of urban employment in India to address these questions. First, it discusses dualism of the labour market to understand how the division of labour institutionalises certain rules for economy-wide use. Second, it contends that the State is torn between multiple goals and cannot be treated monolithically. Third, it explores how dualism within the labour market is affected by changing global technical standards and the newer forms of industrial relations that emerge. The argument is that for institutions to embrace both efficiency and equity a shared understanding of goals and procedural language is required between actors and a close attention to the everyday work process of organisations and individuals. Technical regulations and standards permeate industry in diverse ways and exacerbate existing tensions between varied State priorities and make more unclear the costs and context for distributing uncertainty and ensuring cooperation around issues such as training and insurance. The paper lists some salient features of the construction sector in Bangalore, India. Finally, it briefly discusses the relevance of this approach of dualism and institutionalisation in the face of technical standards for the Millennium Development Goals and Decent Work agendas. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Around one billion people who live in slums globally have low quality housing and poor living conditions (UN, 2020). However, such global estimates do not provide a full description of different types of deprivations experienced by the urban poor, often resulting in inaccurate estimates of the extent of housing challenge. An all-encompassing, single analytical category of "slums" limits its usefulness for planning and policymaking purposes. Slum population as an urban metric also presents challenge for comparative analysis mainly because slum definitions vary country by country. We argue that current approaches of slum enumeration fail to recognize the true extent and nature of housing deprivations, effectively undermining the urgent need to address housing issues for urban poor in developing countries and rarely providing any basis for concrete policy actions. We use a methodological framework originally developed by Patel et al. (2014) and apply it to a large-scale dataset from Census of India (2011) consisting of 1% sample of India's entire urban population. This is one of the first studies to use a large-scale micro-data to provide reliable estimates of the extent and nature of multiple housing deprivations in the country. This paper demonstrates how India's official slum statistics underestimate the extent of housing problems in India. Moreover, we show how levels of multiple deprivations may be useful in identifying the most deprived populations and, by logical extension, targeting the most deservingbeneficiaries of slum policies. Further, the paper discusses how such an approach can be helpful in determining types of interventions and targeting beneficiaries. The approach can be easily expanded to other countries and significantly contribute to current debates about measurement and monitoring of Sustainable Development Goals pertaining to housing and basic services for the urban poor across the globe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines the current trends in Indian urbanization, a country known to be the second most populous country in the world. It aims to explore whether India, with its prevailing urban physical infrastructure bottlenecks and targeted policies to overcome the same, is equipped enough to sustain a growing urban population. Due to the excessive concentration of population in cities, the link between urbanization and development has evolved as a critical concern for policy makers. The paper employs a situation-actor-process (SAP) - learning-action-performance (LAP) [SAP-LAP] model of inquiry to assess the state of urban physical infrastructure in India and indicates future actions necessary from the standpoint of reaching the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) target of inclusive, consistent, sustainable and resilient infrastructure to bolster economic progress and social welfare, with an emphasis on affordable and even-handed access to all. There has been paucity of studies in the recent past which explore government's role in recognizing physical infrastructure as a sustaining factor to urbanization and its paradoxical policy response—excessive zeal on the one hand and extreme apathy on the other—to urban development issues. The SAP-LAP framework shall assist systemic exploration of various issues in India's urbanization, with specific emphasis on physical infrastructure. This holistic approach would enable to identify further actions to realize sustainable growth and livability benefits of urbanization for India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Slums pose a significant challenge for urban planning and policy as they provide shelter to a third of urban residents. UN-Habitat reports that, in 2001, approximately 924 million people lived in slums or informal settlements across the world (UN-Habitat, 2003). However, varying definitions of what constitutes a slum result in different slum population estimates. Most definitions treat a slum as a community of several households, rarely recognizing that housing conditions differ for each individual household within the area. Moreover, definitions of slums usually take a dichotomous approach whereby a place is either a slum or not. Little attempt is made to go beyond this slum/non-slum dichotomy. This paper moves beyond the traditional ways of defining a slum by proposing a new household level enumeration of slums and developing Slum Severity Index (SSI), which measures the level of deprivation on a continuous scale based on the UN-Habitat's slum definition. We apply this new approach of analyzing slums to a household survey dataset to estimate the total number of slum households in Mumbai and Kolkata, two megacities in India. To contrast our approach, we compare these estimates with the Census of India's. The comparison highlights stark differences in the two estimates and the slum/non-slum household classifications. The estimates by the Census are considerably smaller than those based on the UN-Habitat definition in both cities. By applying the SSI, we also demonstrate intra-urban variability in housing conditions within our study cities. The analysis highlights differences in slum profiles measured in terms of both housing deprivation levels and housing deprivation types in both cities. The main objective of this study is to demonstrate the usefulness of the household level analysis of slums in drawing implications for designing and implementing slum policies. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Long-term institutional under-investment has resulted in severe infrastructure and service deficits in urban India, with disproportionately higher impacts in small towns and on the urban poor. This paper researches existing policy literature to examine urban governance and civic challenges, and the implementation of urban reforms against the backdrop of two policy initiatives: the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act 1992 that recommends urban governance devolution; and the programmatic Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) that attempts to effect governance reforms, and improve urban infrastructure and basic services, including affordable housing for the poor. However, there has been inadequate governance devolution from states to urban governments, and the pace of decentralisation is uneven across states. Also infrastructure projects sanctioned for completion by March 2012 under JNNURM remain incomplete and have been granted a two-year extension until March 2014. Policy assessments point to political economy factors and inadequate management capacity as key institutional challenges impacting effective urban reforms in India. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: While the fast pace of urbanization in India creates a strong demand for serviced urban land, the local governments, the entities responsible for providing this land, face strong opposition to compulsory land acquisition, the traditional method of acquiring land for planned development. Furthermore, poor fiscal health restricts local governments’ ability to provide high-quality infrastructure and services. Land Pooling and Reconstitution (LPR) offers a solution. This paper analyzes the use of LPR in the state of Gujarat, India, highlights the key success factors, suggests reforms that would increase the tool’s effectiveness, and identifies the lessons learned from Gujarat’s experience. Specific lessons include the following: use revenues from the previous LPR projects to fund infrastructure and services in the new projects using a revolving fund mechanism; delink the resolution of land ownership disputes from LPR scheme preparation and approval process; institute extensive grievance redressal process; and develop infrastructure early to garner landowner support for LPR. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper presents two case studies on the efforts by a community-based organisation to promote a sustainable integrated waste management system in Indian mega cities. This effort was initiated in 1989 by a local non-governmental organisation (NGO) called EXNORA and is based on a ‘zero waste management scheme’ set up, run and financed by the residents themselves. As this model has been widely quoted as successful, the study aims at learning from two communities implementing this model. Results are reported from a survey of the two schemes that used various tools to assess both their performance and sustainability in selected residential areas of two Indian cities, Chennai and Hyderabad. The results indicate limited success of the schemes both in saving a significant fraction of the generated waste from dumping, and in rehabilitating the local poor. However, they show that motivated individuals can successfully set up and manage waste collection systems that lead to overall environmental improvements. The differences in the two schemes reflect how the local assets and contexts impact on the success of the scheme. The scheme in a rich neighbourhood of Hyderabad was less ambitious in its overall objectives and focussed on the provision of a waste management service, using the opportunity to provide local employment to a socially deprived fraction of the population. The scheme in a middle-class area of Chennai, although pioneering in its approach, suffered from diseconomies of scale and lack of social integration, making it less viable in the medium to long term. Both schemes suffered from a lack of community involvement, motivation and political support, which threatens the long-term sustainability of the enterprise. The research concludes that the role that communities can realistically play in management of their own waste depends on the local context. The system advocated by EXNORA seems to require significant local resources, and political and technical support which are hard to find and sustain without strong local leaders. Another model set up in the city of Visakhapatnam is finally introduced as an alternative. This is based on triangular contracts between the municipality, the residents and micro-enterprises and may provide a good solution in dealing with the technical and commercial aspects which communities find difficult. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Inadequate environmental sanitation in many cities is a major cause of diseases and is a drain on the economy by way of lost workdays, cost of treatment and cleanup activities. Municipal authorities and policymakers need to act fast to address this issue. Sustainable waste management provides a comprehensive inter-disciplinary framework for addressing the problems of managing urban solid waste, in the resource constrained developing countries where quality of such services are poor and costs are high often with no effective means of recovering them. Upgrading the coverage of waste management and services and increasing their efficiency is a precondition for improving the environmental quality of cities. This paper highlights the fact that the involvement and participation of all the stakeholders such as the waste generators, waste processors, formal and informal agencies, non-governmental organisations and financing institutions is a key factor for the sustainable waste management. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The housing sector in India for several decades faced a number of set-backs, such as an unorganized market, development disparities, a compartmentalized development approach and a deterrent rent control system. There was not even a concerted attempt to understand the housing problem let alone promote it. Reforms introduced in the sector during the 1990s, however, have overturned the situation to a great extent. The designing of a shelter policy, the organization of the housing finance market, the introduction of fiscal incentives, increased public investment, legal reforms and others initiatives have brought about a number of changes in the housing sector. Interestingly, these changes have been concerned with both reducing the housing shortage and increasing the number of quality housing stock besides increased access to various other housing amenities like safe drinking water, good sanitation and household electricity. However, the reform initiatives of the housing sector need to take deep roots and to go a long way to address the growing incidence of sub-standard and dilapidated housing stock for further minimizing the deprivations of housing amenities. This paper considers a few policy options towards addressing the challenges of the housing sector. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Public–private partnership (PPP) is the most prominent urban housing policy that has emerged in the last decade in India. Housing reforms in Kolkata, under the flagship of PPP has taken the city into a different league after decades of ineffective housing policy. This paper investigates the dynamics of PPP policy in Kolkata, where public housing agencies have assumed both facilitator and regulator roles within a socialist institutional setting to achieve a balance between market forces and the needs of the low-income people. At the performance level, the joint sector brings together the efficiency in production and technical and marketing expertise of the private sector with the accountability and righteousness of the public sector. However, and despite some reform attempts, at the operational level, major bottlenecks are identified including antiquated legislation, besides high municipal taxes, stamp duties and sanction fees. Housing production under the PPP model to date is impressive in terms of costs and quality, but minuscule in terms of numbers. It is still early to comment on the likely long-term success of such partnerships. However, given the huge housing stock deficiency, high proportion of low-income groups in the city and slow pace of regulatory reforms, it is argued that future success is contingent upon the inclusion of low-income communities, which comprise half of the population of Kolkata. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]