Governance

You walk up to the counter and pick up your serving of piping hot sambar rice and sit in a neat row of chairs under colourful umbrellas. You make a mental note to pick up some coffee from the small kiosk on the premises on your way out. After polishing off your meal, you pay Rs 5, a fraction of what it would cost you anywhere in the city, as you have just eaten at Amma canteen 2.0. This could well be the future of the ubiquitous, government-run, low-cost eateries as its management has been turned over to a trust…

We, the citizens of Mumbai are extremely thankful and grateful to Mumbai's Municipal Commissioner's extraordinary leadership during this Corona Pandemic. In most of the actions, they have taken citizen’s voice at the centre of decision-making and particularly while overseeing the “chase Corona” policy. This piece is regarding the agents responsible for collecting the Mask Penalty of Rs 200. (Read about the penalty here.) Taking strict measures to check on the spread of coronavirus, Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) imposed strict rules for people travelling in public transport and visiting shopping malls in September 2020. It also announced that people…

A deadly plague. A committed and determined municipal commissioner. An aware and active citizenry. That was the beginning, in 1994, of Surat’s remarkable 25 plus year journey: from being the country’s dirtiest city with zero basic infrastructure, to the second-best managed city with well-maintained civic infrastructure. “The biggest success of the then commissioner S R Rao was that he changed the mindset of an entire population” says textile industrialist, Indravadan Mahadevwala. “Till then, we had a municipal corporation only by name.” Surat citizens were always known to be the happy-go-lucky types. Its decentralised textile industry had prospered enough to profit…

Broken footpaths, leaky taps, or uncollected garbage, life in Mumbai must come with a crash course in grievance redressal methods. But it's only easy to lodge complaints with BMC, not get them resolved. Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is good at taking citizen complaints. You can call BMC's 1916 helpline where an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) will direct you to an operator who will note your complaint. Or you can log on to the BMC website where "complaints" is an easy find on the menu. Choose your preferred language and fill an online complaint form selecting your complaint category from the…

Indian government wants to develop a ‘green city’ in every state of the country, powered by renewable energy. The ‘green city’ will mainstream environment-friendly power through solar rooftop systems on all its houses, solar parks on the city’s outskirts, waste to energy plants and electric mobility enabled public transport systems. India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) on December 3rd unveiled a concept note stating that Prime Minister Narendra Modi desires one city in each state to be developed as a green city that will meet all its energy requirements from renewable sources of energy. The ministry notes that the idea…

It cannot be denied that 2020 had much to occupy the powers that be and also the rest of us, in this our city of Madras that is Chennai. Given that matters concerning heritage receive scant attention even in normal years, it is no surprise that there has been even less in the one that has just ended. But if we let matters drift this way, we may soon end up having very little to show as far as our built heritage is concerned. Some upsides There have been some positive developments – the Chepauk Palace restoration is going on…

Owning a house is the dream of a lifetime for all of us. In a city, owning an independent home is impossible even for the upper-middle class. So, an apartment is the only choice available for 90% of urban citizens. The other less attractive alternative is living in the extreme outskirts of the city in an independent house and traveling for longer hours to reach office every day.  Despite the housing market crisis post-2012, apartment prices have not come down. The price of apartments has largely stagnated since 2012 and now there's an oversupply of inventories. As of 2017, there…

A separate law for Bengaluru’s governance, to solve the city’s countless civic problems, has been on the cards since 2008. But when the state Legislature eventually passed the BBMP Bill on December 11, it seemed that years of deliberations on the law had been futile. It was in 2008 that the Kasturirangan Committee report on ‘Governance in the Bangalore Metropolitan Region and BBMP’ suggested a separate municipal law for Bengaluru (instead of the Karnataka Municipal Corporations Act, 1976, that applies to all corporations in the state). In 2010, the ABIDe task force - constituted by the BJP government under B…

A quick mapping of urban reforms in India confirms that power largely still vests with the state and central governments. Despite the 74th Constitutional Amendment, no state has devolved all 18 functions mentioned in the twelfth schedule such as urban planning, forestry, or slum improvement to municipal corporations that run India’s large metropolises. Praja, a non profit, that advocates for policy changes in urban governance, released an Urban Governance Index which explores four themes to understand the extent of urban decentralisation in India. The themes are empowered city-elected representatives and legislative structure; empowered city administration; empowered citizens; and fiscal empowerment. The…

Last week, Maharahstra's Cabinet Minister of Tourism and Environment, Aaditya Thackeray announced that Mumbai has been selected as a "C40 city"—a consortium of the world’s leading cities taking bold action against climate change. Thackeray also tweeted his belief that "cities can lead climate change initiatives", but this attribution seems like wishful thinking for Indian cities. Unlike New York City or Los Angeles in the United States, Mumbai is not empowered to lead climate change or any other initiative. Here are just a few lessons Mumbai can learn from Los Angeles (LA) whose mayor, Eric Garcetti, steered the committee that included…