Tao of Alternative architecture
Paraphrasing Cobb from Inception the movie— “What is the most resilient parasite? Bacteria? A virus? An intestinal worm? An idea. Resilient… highly contagious. Once an idea has taken hold of the brain it’s almost impossible to eradicate. An idea that is fully formed – fully understood – that sticks; right in there somewhere.” In this […]
Sustaining villages while the Country Urbanises
Approaches and Strategies to ensuring Development and Sustenance of rural settlements in India As per the World Bank estimates, 65.56% of South Asia was rural in 2019. While attending to the complex urban challenge there is undoubtedly a need to address challenges of the still large rural sector. “Delhi Declaration” submitted to the GoI in […]
Planning Education and Profession in the Global South
In the global south, particularly in countries like India, Indonesia and a few others, we are witnessing a paradoxical situation, where, despite rapid urbanization and higher vulnerabilities due to poverty and climate change, the role of planners and planning professionals have been declining steadily. With about 8000 towns and cities and about 400 million residents, India […]
What Should Indian Students of Architecture Be Concerned About?
As of mid-December 2020, as per the Council of Architecture (CoA) there are 469 colleges of architecture sanctioned to offer B.Arch. degrees, with an allowed intake of about 24,000 students per year. Even if all colleges are not operating at full strength, that will mean about 20,000 architects will graduate every year. The current number […]
Municipal Governance: Role of the Elected and Executive- 2
After 70 years of republic and relatively slow rate of urbanization that will place some 840 million people in over 7900 cities and towns by 2050, doubling of the current urban population in just 30 more years, out of the three levels of government –national, state and local—the municipal government looks the weakest. The 74th […]
Municipal Governance: Role of the Elected and Executive- 1
After 70 years of republic and relatively slow rate of urbanization that will place some 840 million people in over 7900 cities and towns by 2050, doubling of the current urban population in just 30 more years, out of the three levels of government –national, state and local—the municipal government looks the weakest. The 74th […]
Sector based Pooled Finance Mechanisms for Urban Infra Financing
Background: The urbanisation process in India is the defining trend of the economic growth and there is an associate rising demand for investments in urban infrastructure. However, the urban infrastructure in India is facing chronic shortages in investments and inadequate Operation and Maintenance (O&M), which has led to problems such as inadequate service coverage, inequitable […]
Homelessness and the Right to the City in India
Homelessness constitutes one of the worst violations of the human right to adequate housing and the right to life as well as interrelated human rights to health, food, work/livelihood, security of the person and home, privacy, water, and sanitation, among other rights. Independent experts estimate that one per cent of India’s urban population (at least […]
Cities and Women Informal Workers
The vast majority of urban workers in India today (nearly 80 per cent) are informally employed. The urban informal workforce is engaged in a wide range of activities from manufacturing in small family units, to services like domestic workers and electricians, to trade in small shops or on the streets, to manual labour, notably in […]
City Planning and Urban Informal Livelihoods
India in Comparative Perspective The vast majority of urban workers in India today (nearly 80 per cent) are informally employed. The urban informal workforce is engaged in a wide range of activities from manufacturing in small family units, to services like domestic workers and electricians, to trade in small shops or on the streets, to manual labour, notably in construction, to transport workers. Women are a particularly invisible part of this urban work force as they tend to be […]
