Navya has 12 years of experience in journalism, covering development, urban governance and environment. She was earlier Senior Journalist, Citizen Matters, and Reporter, The New Indian Express. She has also freelanced for publications such as The News Minute, Factor Daily and India Together. Navya won the All India Environment Journalism Award, 2013, for her investigative series on the environmental violations of an upcoming SEZ in Bengaluru, published in Citizen Matters. She also won the PII-UNICEF fellowship in 2016 to report on child rights in Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Navya has an MA in Political Studies from Jawaharlal Nehru University, and a PG Diploma from the Asian College of Journalism.
We spoke to two eminent economists on issues concerning creation of urban employment guarantee schemes; both stressed on decentralisation and involvement of local governments.
Several new movements have fielded independent candidates for city corporations and municipalities across the state in the ongoing local body elections.
A critical step in containing coronavirus is contact tracing — identifying anyone who came in contact with an infected person, quarantining and monitoring them. But across Indian states, there seem to be significant discrepancies in the way this is being done.
A recent survey among close to 3000 employees of an IT company in Gurugram highlighted the city’s traffic woes. But it also yielded interesting data points that indicate improved cycling infrastructure could change things here.
In a land of 453 million internal migrants, a majority among whom seek work in cities, children’s education is the greatest casualty. Government schemes notwithstanding, most migrant children never end up joining school in host cities or eventually drop out.
Slums are increasingly being evacuated in Indian cities, often violently, to make way for city ‘beautification’, smart cities and even book fairs. But no one tracks where the evicted poor go.
The Centre has been actively promoting municipal bonds as a source to fund development of cities, but those with lower credit ratings may not find it a very smooth option to raise money through the same.
Carpooling can provide a comfortable alternative to private transport, while reducing congestion on city roads. But many factors like novelty of the concept and lack of government support are holding back companies in the space.
The recent strike by MTC drivers in Chennai over demands for a wage hike, and in several cities in the past, raises an important question: how are these key drivers of the urban public transport system remunerated?
Consumer complaints are extremely common in the telecom sector. Here is what you should know about operators’ obligations and how you can hold them accountable.
Cheap, environment-friendly and easy, carpooling is slowly gaining in popularity, especially among office-goers, and could potentially reduce congestion on crowded city roads.
As e-commerce and the virtual marketplace become increasingly popular, here are some tips on how to shop smart online, and what to do if you have complaints.
India’s most hyped urbanisation scheme, the Smart Cities Mission, grabbed significant interest and foreign investment but questions remain over delays and eventual impact of the mission.
As 2017 comes to an end, Citizen Matters takes stock of developments and conversations around key talking points in our cities. In the first of the series, we look at pollution in urban India.
Even though the National Urban Livelihoods Mission prescribes permanent, 24X7 shelters for the urban homeless, most of our cities can accommodate less than six percent of such population in the official shelter homes.
