India more urban than we know? How policies fail to keep up with transition

24,000 'villages' with populations greater than towns lose out on policies for urban areas

The village of Rarhi in north Bihar’s Darbhanga district has a population of over 36,000, with 7,500 households according to the last Census in 2011. That’s more than Adoor in Kerala, which is classified three steps above in the size hierarchy as a class 3 town with a population close to 29,000.

Rarhi is one of 24,000 such settlements in India with populations larger than towns (a town has a minimum population of 5,000 according to census criteria), but are not classified as urban because less than 25% of the population is engaged