News that a comprehensive plan is being developed by the urban affairs ministry, with a focus on the areas around SEZs, is extremely welcome on several counts. Not only is it welcome because the local and federal authorities need a set of guidelines within which to frame policy about new and growing townships, but also because of what it represents: an attempt, unfortunately far too rare from an Indian ministry, to solve a big problem before it actually becomes a big problem.

India’s made such efforts before. The National Housing and Habitat Policy, which came into force last year, focuses on “regional planning approaches”, in an attempt to ensure a “symbiotic rural-urban continuum”, whatever that might mean. In effect, it merely restated the importance of states’ town and country planning acts. But most of those acts are reactive; in some cases, such as in Tamil Nadu, the act for years constrained development by outlining a maximum cost of development per hectare rendered ludicrously low by inflation. Clearly a better approach than simply punting the issue to the states was needed.

The usual Indian approach is, of course, to build something and check whether it is sustainable later. (Clearly, we learnt nothing from Fatehpur Sikri.) Thus we see enormous buildings going up in alleys without parking facilities; we have areas set aside for malls or institutions with no public transport facilities nearby. There are sometimes good reasons for this, usually centring on government red tape and absurd zoning regulations. But when it comes to planning, a little forethought is actually expected. The government has chosen to push SEZs as a method of changing land use, and these columns have consistently supported this in principle. That someone in government has recognised that the policy will create artificial borders, and that those margins will need attention — attracting as they will unstructured development — is truly remarkable given the reactive nature of policy in this domain. If only government could pay as much attention to other unintended consequences of its action.