India’s growth trajectory reveals the sheer diversity in the nature, pace and scale of change across its urban centers. They are spread across the spectrum, from small village towns finding themselves on the cusp of being deemed urban, to members of the densest urban agglomerations in the world. Research has indicated the existence of multiple challenges with drawing watertight boundaries around the definition of what constitutes urban. Often, limited definitions of categorizing urban regions can create restrictions in the way policymakers and planners shape instruments of action. Additionally, building contextual knowledge of the interconnected geographies within which new towns and city regions are emerging and operating remains critical to make sense of the way cities themselves are developing.
This blog glimpses into the complex interlinkages that exist within the geographies Indian cities occupy and impact. These four books, published between 2021-2023, take a nuanced look at ‘urban’ lives and ecosystems and in doing so, touch upon the throbbing pulse of cities finding their place in a rapidly urbanizing India.
Subaltern Frontiers: Agrarian City-Making in Gurgaon (2021) narrates the story of India’s remarkable urban transformation by examining the politics of land and labor that have shaped the city of Gurgaon. Deconstructing the dazzling pace of urbanization in Indian cities through the lens of Gurgaon, the book looks at what changed, the actors who made it possible, and the stakes they negotiated, as the city’s once agrarian past gave way to a metropolitan future driven towards servicing the largest urban agglomeration in the world. The book deftly brings together the forcefield created by the interlinked realms of urban land governance and planning, agrarian history and labor markets in a post-liberalization India that was soaking in new aspirations of creating wealth.
Even as urban planners and policymakers continue to study and analyze the socio-economic and demographic changes in small towns in India, few outside of Jharkhand would have heard of Hazaribagh. Part travelogue, part memoir and part biography, Mihir Vatsa’s Tales of Hazaribagh weaves together the story of the hill town of Hazaribagh (literally translating to “a thousand gardens”), as the parallel journey of discovery- of self and place. Once a sanatorium to the British soldiers and now divisional headquarters for the Chhotanagpur plateau, the changing face of its local ecology remains the protagonist in this tale.
A growing body of literature on Indian cities can help unpack the dynamic nature of urban ecosystems. While this is by no measure a comprehensive list, it can help initiate wider discussions on what makes our cities and city regions truly unique.
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