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Lessons from Gurgaon, India's private city
... Consequently, large real estate companies built up huge areas in Gurugram, starting a wave of development. These took the form of high-end residential and commercial projects, which favoured the wealthy while sidelining the interests of other stakeholders (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). The absence of a municipal corporation until 2008, further facilitated this private developer-led model of development over guaranteeing public services (Chatterji, 2013;Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). ...
... These took the form of high-end residential and commercial projects, which favoured the wealthy while sidelining the interests of other stakeholders (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). The absence of a municipal corporation until 2008, further facilitated this private developer-led model of development over guaranteeing public services (Chatterji, 2013;Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). This contributed majorly towards inequality in the city while raising questions about public sector accountability. ...
... These deals resulted in a fragmented assimilation of land in the hands of a plethora of private developers, which later resulted in a pixelated development of gated residential neighbourhoods, urban villages, and urban infrastructure (Goldstein, 2015). Additionally, the delivery of urban services and infrastructure has increasingly become privatized and high-priced, leaving some stakeholders to struggle with access to basic services, which would usually be provided by state agencies (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). This model of urban development has become the norm over the last two decades. ...
... Consequently, large real estate companies built up huge areas in Gurugram, starting a wave of development. These took the form of high-end residential and commercial projects, which favoured the wealthy while sidelining the interests of other stakeholders (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). The absence of a municipal corporation until 2008, further facilitated this private developer-led model of development over guaranteeing public services (Chatterji, 2013;Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). ...
... These took the form of high-end residential and commercial projects, which favoured the wealthy while sidelining the interests of other stakeholders (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). The absence of a municipal corporation until 2008, further facilitated this private developer-led model of development over guaranteeing public services (Chatterji, 2013;Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). This contributed majorly towards inequality in the city while raising questions about public sector accountability. ...
... These deals resulted in a fragmented assimilation of land in the hands of a plethora of private developers, which later resulted in a pixelated development of gated residential neighbourhoods, urban villages, and urban infrastructure (Goldstein, 2015). Additionally, the delivery of urban services and infrastructure has increasingly become privatized and high-priced, leaving some stakeholders to struggle with access to basic services, which would usually be provided by state agencies (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). This model of urban development has become the norm over the last two decades. ...
The special issue brings six themes and seven chapters on planning practices and theories from the global South. The booklet is uploaded here by one of the editors.
... Consequently, large real estate companies built up huge areas in Gurugram, starting a wave of development. These took the form of high-end residential and commercial projects, which favoured the wealthy while sidelining the interests of other stakeholders (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). The absence of a municipal corporation until 2008, further facilitated this private developer-led model of development over guaranteeing public services (Chatterji, 2013;Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). ...
... These took the form of high-end residential and commercial projects, which favoured the wealthy while sidelining the interests of other stakeholders (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). The absence of a municipal corporation until 2008, further facilitated this private developer-led model of development over guaranteeing public services (Chatterji, 2013;Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). This contributed majorly towards inequality in the city while raising questions about public sector accountability. ...
... These deals resulted in a fragmented assimilation of land in the hands of a plethora of private developers, which later resulted in a pixelated development of gated residential neighbourhoods, urban villages, and urban infrastructure (Goldstein, 2015). Additionally, the delivery of urban services and infrastructure has increasingly become privatized and high-priced, leaving some stakeholders to struggle with access to basic services, which would usually be provided by state agencies (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). ...
Non-state actors are actively shaping the urbanization process in cities across the world, while centralized modes of governance are experiencing a reduced role. These non-state actors, ranging from institutions, corporations, international and local NGOs, to civil society actors, are playing conflicting roles in the urbanization processes in the Global South, each having a distinctive relationship with the state and with each other. This chapter presents three such distinct roles: that of provision, protest, and profit-making, as adopted by non-state actors in the production of urban space in Beirut, Lebanon, and Gurugram, India. Both contexts critically raise the point of public sector accountability in light of its shrinking role and the increasing role of the non-state actors.
The first section of the chapter investigates how in Lebanon civil society groups and grassroots initiatives either resist undesirable urban development projects initiated by the state, or offer support to local communities, particularly in the aftermath of the Beirut port explosion of August 4, 2020. The case of Beirut examines how civil society actors can act as guardians of the public interest against a predatory state or fill the vacuum created by the public sector to support and provide for the local community. The second section of the chapter analyzes the role of another type of non-state actors – private developers and real estate companies – in the process of designing and implementing the master plan of Gurugram, a city in Haryana, India. The case study shows how profit-oriented projects led by non-state actors result in the marginalization of underprivileged groups.
... As per the latest urban planning document (Master Plan), this urban settlement, referred to as the Gurgaon-Manesar Urban Complex (GMUC), is expected to have a population of 4.25 million by the year 2031 (Dhillon, 2012, p. 4). From being a "little more than a village" having barren land "with no local government, public utilities, or transportation" in the 1970s, Gurgaon has, since the 1990s, become one of the "fastest growing urban centres in India" (Rajagopalan & Tabarrok, 2014).The immediate trigger behind such a rapid urban transformation was the increased demand for space from transnational corporations for the establishment of their back offices and call centres and the development of housing projects for the benefit of middle-class professionals. ...
... Private developers have been allowed to acquire agricultural land and convert it into real estate properties for non-agricultural use. Unique to this process was the withdrawal of the state from making provisions for "essential public goods and urban planning" and the transfer of this responsibility to the private sector (Chatterji, 2013;Rajagopalan & Tabarrok, 2014 ). Even with three master plans in just seven years, the city of Gurgaon continued to experience challenges with basic amenities like water, power, roads, regulated traffic and adequate policing about which the residents from all classes have a lot of complaints. ...
... For instance, the number of unauthorized colonies present in Delhi and Ghaziabad are 1731 and 321, respectively (DDA, 2022; GDA, 2021). Until 2008, Gurugram did not have a municipal corporation or any proper urban local body, which has caused poor infrastructure and urban planning (lack of citywide sewage, electricity, transportation, public amenities, and traffic jams) (Rajagopalan & Tabarrok, 2014). Figure 8 shows the proportion of cities in India with Master plans. ...
Urban expansion and anthropogenic emissions have transformed the natural landscape and modified the thermal environment, which affects the local climate. Therefore, the study aims to explore the variations and linkages between land use land cover (LULC), land surface temperature (LST), air pollution, and heatwaves. The study also analysed their patterns, causes, and impacts. LULC changes were studied using supervised classification, and LST was estimated using the approach described in the Landsat user handbook. The results of the study showed that urban areas expanded by 13.02% with a systematic decline in crop land and green cover during 1989–2020. There was a significant warming trend, with a rise of 2–4 °C in mean LST during the summer from 2000 to 2022. However, a decrease of 3–4 °C in mean LST was observed during 2020–2021 due to lockdown, reduced air pollution, and weather conditions. The maximum LST was recorded over barren areas, while the minimum was over waterbodies. It was found that at all selected stations, the mean concentration of particulate matter (PM) was above the standard limit, while O3 and NO2 were within the limits in rural and low-rise residential areas. The heatwave events had exacerbated the LST and air pollution, which raised the mean LST of 2–3 °C in each class and PM concentration levels in both urban and rural areas. Thus, the output of this integrated study will assist urban planners and policymakers in better planning and policy implementation for designing blue-green sustainable cities that promote a healthy and comfortable lifestyle.
... As Tabarrok and Rajagopalan observe, Gurgaon suffers from a "tragedy of the commons," in which it is land that belongs to no one in particular that gets polluted the most. Dumping doesn't take place on private land (Tabarrok & Rajagopalan, 2015: 2020. From an economic perspective, the best way to address commons problems such as this is not to restrict private activity but to clearly define and enforce rights to private property. ...
In the previous chapter, we examined the limits of urban micro-interventions from a Jacobsian Market Urbanist framework. Here we use that framework to address a different but related set of questions: To what extent is it feasible to consciously plan for “urban vitality”? How much political authority is needed to accomplish this? How workable are some of the recent, imaginative proposals for city planning and rebuilding? We also analyze the nature of different kinds of rules and how they relate to the difference between “governance” and “government,” which entails digging more deeply into some of the concepts we have already been using.
... Initially the Delhi Development Authority managed the supply and demand of land following the rigid control mechanisms of socialist planning. Zoning and land-use rules restricted the supply of land in Delhi, resulting in heightened scarcity of basic services and amenities, which in turn led to a proliferation of illegal construction and corruption in virtually all kinds of building and land allotment (Tabarrok, 2014). ...
Urbanization is the current emerging problem in today's world and metropolitan cities face the adverse outcomes of urbanisation whereby they become dominant centers of commercial and administrative units leading to crowding and congestion at an unprecedented scale. Cities are initially smaller outgrowth areas which eventually grow into new growth centers that are properly planned and segmented around big metropolitan cities to reduce the burden upon them and act as nodal points of development for other smaller settlements who earlier depended on metro cities to fulfill their basic requirements. These are known as growth centers that have their own sphere of influence or hinterland, the size of which is based on the degree of specialization of a growth center. This paper enquires about the rapid physical development process in the outgrowth areas of Gurgaon and Navi Mumbai and deals with ways to delineate them with an integrated approach and devising strategies to solve any future problems in such areas. A comparative study has been done to analyze how each of them grew up to be the respective growth centers for the cities of New Delhi and Mumbai and the delineation method for those areas.
... As of 2013, nearly half of the Fortune 500 Companies have operations in Gurgaon. As a result, Gurgaon has become a leading destination for India's young middle-class workers in the tech industry (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). ...
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to compare and learn from Chandigarh in addressing an orderly urbanisation in India. Chandigarh is considered as a benchmark for city design in India. The aim is recapitulate the city design process and garner useful inputs towards city design process in India.
Design/methodology/approach
Considering the purpose of the study, two research methodologies are identified – namely “case study” and “analytical narrative”. A case study method is usually focused on certain urban systems with a view to explain why certain systems were a success and why some ended up being a failure. It mostly concerns itself with questions of efficiency. A narrative analysis seeks to understand urban development process and change. It appeared in disciplines such as policy analysis, urban history, social science, political science and economics. Analytical narrative evaluates the explanatory performance of new genre, using some philosophy.
Findings
This paper contributes in reinvigorating the aura of Chandigarh and its contribution in developing an Indian city with its own identity. It also reflects upon the series of failure among the recent city planning endeavours, and its avenue of differences from the successful case.
Originality/value
The paper contributes in understanding the existing shortcomings of city design approaches in India from the perspective of a relatively successful case of a functional Indian city. It also helps to point out the forgotten dimensions of city design that contributes in creating a functional city.
... Three factors were instrumental in the growth of the city: its location close to the national capital city of New Delhi (about 30 km), the proximity to the Indira Gandhi International Airport (about 12 km), and the neoliberal policies adopted by the state government to draw private investment. This was supported by efforts at infrastructure provisioning (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok 2014). In particular, the state government adopted policies for the creation of special economic zones (SEZs). ...
Gurgaon is located in the northwest Indian state of Haryana. It has been growing since the 1980s as a recreation, residential, and outsourcing hub. This has been led predominantly by private initiative, though the state has provided a policy environment conducive to this. This process was shaped by the acquisition of agricultural land and water resources from the periphery; this has spawned debates about the equity and justice implications of such growth. Village settlement areas coexist with urban high rises. The city has expanded beyond its carrying capacity; water resources are overstressed and infrastructure falls way short of the requirements.
... As of 2013, there are many companies that have setup their businesses in Gurgaon. Some of them are American Express, General Electric, Motorola, Dell, Microsoft, International Business Machines (IBM) and Google (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok, 2014). The liberal economic policies after the post reform period have also given a major push to the overall development of Gurgaon's economy. ...
... A government, even when it is not a kleptocracy, must also provide justice and define and enforce property rights in order to allow for trade and investment to take place (see e.g., De Soto 2000;f. Rajagopalan and Tabarrok 2014). 1 Political scientists and development economists see state capacity, which is taken to mean the ability of governments to achieve the goals they set out to achieve, as a key aspect of economic development and achieving good governance in the developed world (Fukuyama 2004(Fukuyama , 2011(Fukuyama , 2014. ...
One line of thought in development economics and political science emphasizes the need for state building to achieve economic growth and better outcomes throughout the developing world. Conventionally, this has been conceptualized in terms of “state capacity,” sometimes operationalized via the Worldwide Governance Indicators report. This paper proposes a simple alternative, using two of the five components of the Economic Freedom of the World report, with a greater emphasis placed on state power within an economy, as opposed to its capacity.
This alternative measure, here called the “State Economic Modernity” index (SEM) is a combination of various measures of a state’s willingness and ability to perform its core public goods functions, and the state’s size relative to the economy. It is shown that the SEM index, in combination with the Economic Freedom of the World report, creates intuitive categorizations of economic institutions across countries. The SEM index is shown to relate to various measures of social capital and may be determined by them. Finally, while the SEM index is closely related to economic growth and output as seen in raw correlations, it appears to cause neither upon the inclusion of country fixed effects.
... This approach consists of the broad idea of recognizing neighbourhood association coalitions as a new and separate jurisdiction. Besides the phenomenon of private cities nowadays diffused throughout India and China (Rajagopalan, Tabarrok 2014), an interesting example on the devolutionary approach is represented from the case of the voluntary city of Reston (Virginia). This census-designated place (without any local public administration) contains contractual and private schemes of governance comprised of a coalition of homeowners associations with 50.000 inhabitants and 24.000 dwellings (Foldvary 1994). ...
The community concept has maintained a constant and growing interest in urban studies and many related fields. The origin of this continuing interest seems to derive from the importance of the concept of community within diverse forms of political language and interpretations within different planning practices. In this contribution, through the analysis of different ethical and planning theories, we want to provide an update framework on community action. According to this objective, the argumentation will proceed through a literature review on four ethics theories and three key aspects related to spatial planning, as well as matching this theoretical analysis with exemplifying practices. The final objective is to provide an original analysis on drivers and outcomes of different forms of community, raising general issues that refer to spatial planning, social organization and regulation.
... The growth in Gurgaon between 2001 and 2011 resulted from the lifting of restrictions on the land-acquisition process and development led by private builders. These factors, coupled with the proximity to Delhi and the limited supply of land for business and housing in Delhi, led to Gurgaon's rampant growth during this period (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok 2014). The factors responsible for greater NOIDA's failure to attain the envisioned growth include the lack of direct connectivity with Delhi, the difficult law and order situation, and the scrapping of the international airport at Jewar (ICICI 2013). ...
Spatial-development policies in India have aimed to achieve balanced regional development. However, these attempts have had limited success, as development is still concentrated in certain large urban areas. For that reason, sustainably accommodating the country’s projected population increase remains a challenge. Taking the Delhi National Capital Region (NCR) as a case study and utilizing digitized tehsil boundaries and transport networks from regional plans, along with the recently released 2011 census enumeration, this paper investigates both recent settlement developments and the influence of the transport infrastructure on balanced regional development. The results reveal that population growth is concentrated in and around Delhi. A positive relationship has been established between the provision of major road infrastructure and employment growth in the peripheral areas. According to current trends, reducing disparities will require a mix of top-down and bottom-up approaches to enforce infrastructure-integrated spatial development and to strengthen the regional and local authorities to facilitate plan formulation and implementation. - See more at: http://ascelibrary.org/doi/abs/10.1061/%28ASCE%29UP.1943-5444.0000379#sthash.8XI2bGIq.dpuf
... The growth in Gurgaon between 2001 and 2011 resulted from the lifting of restrictions on the land-acquisition process and development led by private builders. These factors, coupled with the proximity to Delhi and the limited supply of land for business and housing in Delhi, led to Gurgaon's rampant growth during this period (Rajagopalan and Tabarrok 2014). The factors responsible for greater NOIDA's failure to attain the envisioned growth include the lack of direct connectivity with Delhi, the difficult law and order situation, and the scrapping of the international airport at Jewar (ICICI 2013). ...
Spatial-development policies in India have aimed to achieve balanced regional development. However, these attempts have had limited success, as development is still concentrated in certain large urban areas. For that reason, sustainably accommodating the country’s projected population increase remains a challenge. Taking the Delhi National Capital Region (NCR) as a case study and utilizing digitized tehsil boundaries and transport networks from regional plans, along with the recently released 2011 census enumeration, this paper investigates both recent settlement developments and the influence of the transport infrastructure on balanced regional development. The results reveal that population growth is concentrated in and around Delhi. A positive relationship has been established between the provision of major road infrastructure and employment growth in the peripheral areas. According to current trends, reducing disparities will require a mix of top-down and bottom-up approaches to enforce infrastructure-integrated spatial development and to strengthen the regional and local authorities to facilitate plan formulation and implementation.
Increasing purchases of valuable real estate for storing capital have contributed to the soaring prices of modest housing in many global cities and in several South Asian cities such as Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore. Saskia Sassen has drawn attention to the phenomenon of underutilisation of purchased properties existing alongside the acute demand for housing by low- and moderate-income households in the same cities. Despite the gravity of this issue, empirical analyses of urban land transactions remain rare, especially because such purchases often tend to be piecemeal and obscure, involving a multitude of smaller land deals and a variety of actors. This paper examines corporate purchases of urban land in Gurgaon, a city adjacent to New Delhi that has embraced neoliberal economic policies. By creating a land database for the upcoming sectors in the city, the study makes sharply visible: (1) the radical changes in property ownership patterns from agricultural land to luxury gated communities, (2) the growing corporate investments, extreme concentration of land ownership and deeply unequal distribution of urban land and (3) the use of various illicit practices by market-leading companies in land banking.
The fast urban development in India is making evident many social, cultural, and economic complexities reproduced in the city's planning and design. The drive for modernization is becoming the central topic in the national and political debate and becomes more urgent every day. Among these contexts, urban fabrics in-between developing cities, heritage roots, "smart city" missions and "kinetic" cities constitute a framework for research on morphological, functional, social and environmental perspectives. This paper investigates contested locations in Ahmedabad, where informality finds space between heritage structures and recent beautification projects, such as the Sabarmati riverfront. The paper understands how a holistic approach is essential in rethinking and upgrading the spatial and urban conditions of informal settlements in the city and therefore highlights the relevance of adequate lenses to understand these complexities. Like many other cities in India, living in slums or informal settlements is a common phenomenon in Ahmedabad, as they provide affordable housing close to job opportunities. In 2009, AMC (Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation) identified 834 slums, sheltering 23 per cent of the total population of the city. Several conditions and features characterize these settlements since their communities are often from the same region, class, caste, or religion. This paper will analyze case studies in Ahmedabad, where the friction between informality, preservation of heritage structures and new smart city developments is evident. The paper will question various assumptions regarding the informal environment and analyze their cultural and architectural identities, the domestication of heritage structures, and vulnerability within the idea of a smart and globalized Ahmedabad.
Banking sector is referred to be lifeline of the Indian economy and occupies an important and fundamental place in a developing nation like India. Mergers and Acquisitions as a phenomenon are implemented to strengthen the banking system, embrace globalization, improve healthy competition, exploit economies of scale, adopt advanced technologies, raise efficiency and improve profitability. The main objective of this study to examine the profitability and liquidity analysis of select public sector banks in the pre and post merger periods. The study period covers five years the pre and post merger of banks. The year of merger as a base year and hence, it is excluded from the evaluation in order to have consistency in evaluation of pre and post merger performance of acquirer banks.
The year of merger differs in all merger deals. For the purpose of the study, the census method has been adopted to select public sector banks namely the State Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank, Bank of Baroda, Punjab National Bank, IDBI Bank and Oriental Bank of Commerce. The latest mergers have been taken for sample size of the study i.e. after the year 2000 has been considered. The data analysis is done using ratio analysis, descriptive statistics like mean, standard deviation, coefficient of variation, compound annual growth rate and paired t test.
Why are some countries wealthier than others? Recent scholarship on this question has begun to converge on the answer to this question: institutions. Some countries are wealthier than others, on this view, because they have the right institutions. These are a set of well-functioning institutions that allow individuals in society to cooperate and coordinate with each other, and, in the end, secure the welfare gains from that cooperation and coordination. Institutions matter, in other words. But which institutions? In this dissertation, I argue that it is the presence of particular informal institutions (such as social norms) in some societies, and their absence in others, that ultimately decides whether cooperation and coordination is achieved, and welfare gains are secured. I argue that the historical focus on formal institutions (such as formal laws and regulations) is somewhat misplaced, since whether or not people abide by formal institutions is determined by the presence of particular informal rules and norms that govern everyday interaction. In a nutshell: formal institutions matter, but informal institutions rule.
We introduce the case for non-territorial unbundling by taking a discursive approach through public choice and evolutionary economic theory. The argument begins with an appreciation of the many paradoxes and problems of majoritarian voting and proceeds to explore the theory of non-territorial and unbundled governance as means to improve political choice. I find that decoupling political jurisdiction from geographical location (so that citizens can switch political jurisdictions without switching location) and unbundling government (so that collective goods and services can be provided separately by independent public enterprises) will result in greater diversity of governmental forms, a wider range of choice for groups and individuals, and ultimately, better governance. Moreover, I contend that not all bundling should be ruled out; rather, the point is to create an ‘unbundleable’ system of governance and allow political entrepreneurs to discover ways to rebundle functions. Experimentation with bundling, unbundling, and rebundling of the various services states offer elicits the discovery of optimal bundling options for the diversity of citizen preferences.
We introduce the case for non-territorial unbundling by taking a discursive approach through public choice and evolutionary economic theory. The argument begins with an appreciation of the many paradoxes and problems of majoritarian voting and proceeds to explore the theory of non-territorial and unbundled governance as means to improve political choice. I find that decoupling political jurisdiction from geographical location (so that citizens can switch political jurisdictions without switching location) and unbundling government (so that collective goods and services can be provided separately by independent public enterprises) will result in greater diversity of governmental forms, a wider range of choice for groups and individuals, and ultimately, better governance. Moreover, I contend that not all bundling should be ruled out; rather, the point is to create an ‘unbundleable’ system of governance and allow political entrepreneurs to discover ways to rebundle functions. Experimentation with bundling, unbundling, and rebundling of the various services states offer elicits the discovery of optimal bundling options for the diversity of citizen preferences.
We introduce the case for non-territorial unbundling by taking a discursive approach through public choice and evolutionary economic theory. The argument begins with an appreciation of the many paradoxes and problems of majoritarian voting and proceeds to explore the theory of non-territorial and unbundled governance as means to improve political choice. I find that decoupling political jurisdiction from geographical location (so that citizens can switch political jurisdictions without switching location) and unbundling government (so that collective goods and services can be provided separately by independent public enterprises) will result in greater diversity of governmental forms, a wider range of choice for groups and individuals, and ultimately, better governance. Moreover, I contend that not all bundling should be ruled out; rather, the point is to create an ‘unbundleable’ system of governance and allow political entrepreneurs to discover ways to rebundle functions. Experimentation with bundling, unbundling, and rebundling of the various services states offer elicits the discovery of optimal bundling options for the diversity of citizen preferences.
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