Nirman Bhawan in New Delhi houses the Ministry of Urban Development as well as the Ministry of Health. But a look at the population clock installed at its entrance can trigger alarming thoughts about the worsening health of urban India. India’s population, at the moment of writing this column, is 1,142,680,751. It is growing at a rate of 30 per minute and 1.55 crore per year. By 2050, it will be 160 crores, more than China’s by at least 20 crores. Most of this explosive growth will take place in cities, raising our urban population from 35 crores now to over 90 crores in four decades.

Can we cope? We aren’t coping, even at today’s level of urbanisation. Our cities and towns are beset with multiple problems, which are well known. Why is India, whose hoary civilisation prides in having some of the earliest models of planned urban development (Moenjodaro, Indraprastha, Dwarka), unable to meet the crisis? The crisis will become worse if we don’t act now.

In my previous two columns, I had described a near-ideal model of rural development in Hivre Bazar, a village in Maharashtra, and reflected upon what constitutes an Ideal City. Too utopian to think of ideal cities? But can’t we create better cities? Yes, we can. Here are ten ideas.

1. Completely revamp urban governance in India, with an urgent Constitutional amendment. Lack of good governance is at the root of many urban problems-indeed, at the root of most national problems. Very little can change in our cities without better institutional structures of governance, with empowered roles, along with due accountability, for the elected representatives of municipal bodies. Let’s admit that the 74th Amendment of the Constitution during Rajiv Gandhi’s premiership has been woefully inadequate in decentralising powers to local urban bodies and in democratically empowering our urban population. In the present framework, mayors are merely ceremonial figureheads and corporators’ functions are perfunctory. Both play second fiddle to bureaucrats, who neither have live contact with the people nor, with exceptions, have deep emotional connect to the cities where serve in their frequently transferable jobs. Since our mayors have no challenging responsibilities, the quality and stature of the persons occupying that post have drastically come down. Willi Brandt, who was West Berlin’s mayor, later became West Germany’s chancellor. Paris’ mayor Jacques Chirac became France’s president. China’s former president Jiang Zemin was earlier Shanghai’s mayor. Tokyo’s mayor is the second most powerful person in Japan. In India, can you think of a single outstanding, nationally known, mayor?

... contd.