Subir Roy: How well does your city fare?

Annual Survey of India's City-Systems helps us understand which way our leading cities are headed

The findings of the fourth Annual Survey of India’s City-Systems (2016), conducted by Bengaluru-based Janaagraha, are highly educative, while remaining within the drift of insights available in earlier reports. They help us understand which way our leading cities are headed. 

Do leading Indian cities (21 are surveyed and their scores juxtaposed against those of two global leaders, London and New York) have the ability to renew themselves, have plans worth the name to help them get ahead? To the question, “Does your city have a decentralised system of spatial development planning”, the score for 18 out of 21 is poor (3-4 on a scale of 1-10), with London and New York scoring 9.8 each. It is just as well that there is not much of planning because the ability to “implement spatial development plans successfully” is virtually zero, with all cities except one scoring less than one. 

Even without much planning, does a city have adequate funds to invest in “public infrastructure and services”? Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Surat, Ranchi and Delhi all score in the four to five range, with Bengaluru, Bhopal, Dehradun, Ludhiana, and Raipur bringing up the rear with scores below two. This overall score is made up of several factors. One is how much of its own resources make up the total expenditure. In this, Hyderabad leads (7.7), followed by Mumbai (6.6) and Pune (6). Cities which are themselves broke are Patna (1.7), followed by Lucknow (1.8). Interestingly, London scores a poor 4.6 and New York 6.8. So if a city is important, the system will find the necessary resources for it. Per capita spending gives an idea of whether a city spends as much as it should, and on this, the leaders are Mumbai (10) and Thiruvananthapuram (9.4). The middle order consists of Chennai, Pune, Surat and Ahmedabad (in the four to five range). 

Aside from how much a city spends, the key issues are whether it is accountable, efficient and transparent in its spending. Efficiency is partly reflected by the ability to stick to budget timelines. On this, the leaders are Ahmedabad, Delhi, Mumbai, Pune and Surat — all scoring a full 10. On accountability, absolutely no India city is mandated to have its accounts independently or externally audited. And just three cities put their annual accounts in the public domain — Bhubaneswar, Kanpur and Ranchi.

Human resources are the key enabler in getting the best out of spending. In this, overall, Mumbai leads the pack, followed by Kolkata, Pune and Delhi (in that order). Within this, only three cities have adequate staffing strength. Delhi leads with a perfect score of 10, followed by Mumbai and then Kolkata. A critical related issue is whether urban local bodies can draw skilled officials from a dedicated cadre whose members specialise in the running of local bodies. As many as 10 cities do — Bengaluru, Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai, Patna, Pune and Ranchi. With so many well regarded cities in this list, a municipal cardre emerges as a key enabler in delivering quality local government. 

Despite keeping away from the “smart cities” ballyhoo (the phrase does not appear in the entire report), the study takes a look at cities’ ability to make good use of information technology (IT). Pune leads the seven cities (the rest are Bengaluru, Bhopal, Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai and Surat) that overall make some use of IT. The level of use of IT by cities is, however, very patchy. Only one city, Chandigarh, has a digital governance road map, and only Pune puts its schemes and services on its website. Citizens’ participation in urban governance through a local body’s website is minimal. 

A critical element determining the success of urban local bodies is whether they are truly democratic and whether the elected representatives have adequate powers. All states have state election commissions and elections to urban local bodies have been held every five years in most states, except Bengaluru and Hyderabad. On city governments having clout and legitimacy, key elements are whether the mayor is elected directly and has a term of five years. Altogether 14 cities have mayors with five-year terms. But seven metros and large cities – Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Chandigarh, Pune and Surat – are missing from the list. Only six of the 21 cities covered have directly elected mayors — Bhopal, Dehradun, Kanpur, Lucknow, Raipur and Ranchi. Note that none of the metros figure in this list. Not a single mayor has the power to appoint the municipal commissioner or the chief executive of the local body.

A yearly study like this offers a useful benchmark to gauge how a city has fared over a period. During the three-year period 2014-16, among the 21 cities covered, the one that has improved its rank the most is Hyderabad (+12), followed by Bhubaneswar (+10), Kanpur (+7), Pune (+6), Mumbai (+5), Chennai (+4), Bengaluru and Ranchi (both +2) and Lucknow (+1). The cities that have lost the most in terms of rank are Surat (-10), Raipur and Jaipur (both -9), Patna (-7), Delhi and Ahmedabad (both -4), Bhopal (-3), and Kolkata and Dehradun (both -2), and Lucknow (-1).  

The great success story in urban India for the period is clearly Bhubaneswar. Correspondingly, the city that has remained consistently at the bottom of the league is Chandigarh (21st in all three years). At first blush, this seems counterintuitive. Independent India’s foremost planned city, designed by Le Corbusier, which looks so orderly and posh, scores very poorly in “decentralised system of spatial development planning” (never went beyond its first blueprint?). On the other hand, chaotic, messy and congested Kolkata does well on all criteria but particularly so in “empowerment and legitimate political representation”. Thiruvananthapuram leading the league table (scores well on all counts), followed by Hyderabad (improved the most) and Chennai (also near the top and improved substantially), will not surprise anybody. 
 

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