Leaderspeak | Shared Goals
All cogs of the wheel need to work together The recent changing priorities of cities because of the Pandemic, and before that, because of looming dangers of climate change is bringing transformation in urban management worldwide. The meaningful transformation needs collective responsibility, shared agendas, and joint efforts of all tiers of governments in the region and collaboration with associations elsewhere for achieving the common agenda of our urban spaces
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overty and inequality are at the root of most of the problems cities are facing today. It is a universal issue. Let’s look closer and focus on the Indian situation. The causes of urban poverty can be linked to the lack of infrastructure in rural areas, forcing inhabitants of these regions to seek employment in mega-cities. These migrants are often not skilled and unable to get a job in the formal economy eventually ending up in the vicious cycle of lowpaying, insecure jobs. They also live in informal settlements and often do not become legal citizens, and at times, they cannot access civic services. If the policymakers can address this issue at the village level, it will lessen the cities’
burden. The government has shown intention with introducing the Rurban mission, but the on-ground impact is yet to be analyzed. The government needs to stress on effective implementation of such schemes and programs so that cities and villages can grow and prosper together. The development of one should not happen at the cost of the other. There is a strong need to strengthen policies for addressing issues of rural and urban habitats. City officials, leaders and their rural counterparts would have to work together. Every city wants to become efficiently managed, and it can only be done when they are serving the population as per its resource capacity. It can be done when the government creates a healthy infrastructure at the village level. People need not come to
The states have to take the initiative and transfer control over functions and corresponding powers to the cities, while the authority of monitoring and holding cities accountable could rest with the state. This suggestion was proposed during the National Consultation on Urban Governance in January 2020 in New Delhi
28 February 2021 | www.urbanupdate.in
cities for every small thing like a health check-up or sending their children to a good school. Such facilities must be available everywhere. There is no denying that we need buzzing cities for a prosperous economy. Still, cities will have to become efficient, attractive and sustainable in their practices for supporting long-term sustained growth. Cities will have to function at full steam.
State and city coordination
In the Indian context, state governments’ role becomes crucial in ensuring that their cities’ development model is in the right shape as the financing of most of the programs and projects comes from the coffer of the states. The demand from cities for transferring more powers to them is long pending. There is a need to introduce specific systematic changes as envisioned in the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act (CAA) that has not been implemented uniformly in letter and spirit in all the states. City governments need to hold complete control over all the 18 functions specified in the Twelfth Schedule, 74th CAA and other vital urban functions that need to be planned and executed at the city level. The states have to take the initiative and transfer control over functions and corresponding powers to the cities, while the authority of monitoring and holding cities accountable could rest with the state. Another issue is the overlapping role of multiple agencies in a city. Local governments should also be empowered and made a nodal agency
