Public reaction to the government’s ‘Master Plan 2021’ for Delhi has been unusually muted. It appears that we are not sure about how to question its premise or how it can be improved. The Supreme Court, which first opened the can of worms that started the entire exercise, will no doubt look at the legality of the Plan. It should go deeper: it should enquire whether the Plan is constitutionally sound.

For instance, suppose a peasant in a backward state were to file a PIL questioning the government’s decision to invest more and more in Delhi deliberately, causing land costs to rise exponentially, even as the poor villager is denied even a tiny fraction of that patronage. The Court will then be forced to consider whether the disparity in state expenditure is so excessive that it contravenes the fundamental right of villagers to equality before the law. Is a citizen of Delhi more equal than a villager in Orissa?

Economists should also ask whether the Plan will really make Delhi a richer place than at present. At the expected rate of growth, by the year 2021 Delhi will be four times ‘richer’. Is that correct? Will citizens of Delhi have four times better dwellings, four times less pollution, four times better transportation, four times better water supply? Then is the promised growth in prosperity a reality or an illusion?

High-rise construction is the core of the Delhi Master Plan. The planners seem to be unaware that, across the world, high-rise apartments for the poor have become a security disaster. In France, in Britain, in the US, huge apartment blocks built at great expense had to be abandoned, even pulled down, because crime in such buildings became uncontrollable.

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