The sweeping reforms to labour laws introduced on 26th November 2020, has been described by many as a logical extension of three decades of neo-liberal hegemony that has sought to extend the hands of capital and dilute welfare responsibilities. With 44 central labour laws being consolidated into 4 labour codes, it is vital to review […]
Mainstreaming Skilled Women Construction Workers- Part 2: Pathways to Productive High Skilled Jobs for Women Construction Workers: Successes and Challenges
In 2015, when the Prime Minister launched the Skill India Mission, he announced the vision of making India the ‘resource capital of the world’. The construction industry, which is expected to generate 83 million jobs by 2022, will play a critical role in realizing this vision. A vital question that needs to be addressed at […]
Mainstreaming women construction workers in higher skilled productive roles – Part 1
Are there women plumbers, carpenters, scaffolding experts – how often do we find them on construction sites? While the construction industry generates employment for about 15 million women, they are confined to jobs of the ‘dead-end variety’ marked by low wages, low stability, low productivity and low mobility. The construction industry in general is marked […]
Reconfiguring rental towards inclusion
With a significant urban housing shortage and large floating populations that move in and out of cities for education, exploration, or work, rental housing has been an important element of housing in Indian cities. It has received considerable policy attention in the wake of the 2020 migrant crisis. Our third webinar focuses on the viability […]
Are the urban rivers in India annihilated?
The extractive development and competitive growth models coupled with haphazard urban expansion plans are the root cause for the dying or dead urban rivers in India. The present trends of urban expansion programs in the country suggest that urban ecosystem is seemingly very heavily stressed and that the conditions are likely to go from bad […]
Inventing Institutional Structures For Delivering Affordable Shelter
Every State in India has an Affordable Housing policy. These are then sought to be implemented through various arms – be they Urban Local Bodies, Development Corporations or private developers. There is the PMAY for some financial support. We now have a national policy for rental housing on the anvil. The conception of all these […]
Whose sustainability? Discovering civic agency for the future Indian city
The UN’s World Commission on Environment and Development, also known as the Bruntland Commission, defined sustainable development in 1987 as development “that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” The ‘future generations’ are key stakeholders in the process of achieving sustainability but it is […]
Inclusion of Wastewater treatment for funding for < 1 lakh population cities under the current Swachhta Mission: Prospects and Challenges
The Government of India has been pushing the agenda of Wastewater management with the launch of SBM 2.0. Complete FSM and Wastewater management for cities with < 1 lakh population is expected to be proposed under the mission. While FSSM and wastewater management needs of cities with population of more than 1 lakh are addressed […]
Supporting and strengthening civil society in addressing the urban challenge: How can CSR/philanthropy help?
India is in the throes of rapid urbanisation. The proportion of urban population increased from 17.3% in 1951 to 31.8% in 2011. The urban population of 377 million in 2011 is projected to almost double to 820 million in 2050. On the one hand, urbanisation seems to hold great promise. By 2030, 70% of net […]
The city and the right to work
We have all been seeing how the city is being transformed over the last thirty years from a place to work and live in, to one that is a site for investment and profit-making. Two major aspects of this transformation are the shift from manufacturing to services, and the privatisation of services. The NSO data […]