Indian urbanisation has changed its trajectory significantly in the last twenty years or so.  Fledgling attempts to accomplish an agrarian transition towards industry-led urbanisation have given way to urbanisation-led development. The shift from state control over land and housing markets to significant private sector expansion is not only dramatic but has led to a situation where ‘urban’ has become synonymous with real estate-led urbanisation. This paper traces these dramatic developments of the last twenty years and attempts to decipher what these developments mean in a country whose empirical urban reality is defined as much by slums and informal housing as by more formal housing. What are the dimensions of this development? What forms does it take? What do they mean for whom?

Urbanisation in India was itself conventionally understood as ‘urbanisation elsewhere’ – a deviant experience dominated by poverty, informality and dependence upon the ‘central’ sites and processes of development located in the North. Its housing deficiencies were thus understood through a lens of limited resources. Contemporarily, the centre-periphery debate acquires a new edge and complexity as the ‘centre’ shifts South-ward and the ‘periphery’ gets interconnected with ‘centering’ processes. It is evident that there is a very real shift in the geopolitics of the world with a tilt towards emerging economies like India. However, does this shift mean a transformation of the empirical realities of slums and informalities and poverty? What is the meaning of the shifting discourse of plentitude for the notions of North, South and elsewhere?  The real estate and housing sector is particularly useful in understanding these complexities due to the scale of its growth and its connections with multi-scalar processes.

There is inadequate formal housing stock at affordable prices to accommodate the surging population of Delhi. According to the projections, Delhi needs 24 lakh new housing units by the year 2021. Of these, 54per cent   are required for the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) and Low Income Group (LIG). When the migration flow confronts the lack of developed and planned settlements at affordable prices, it results in formation of unplanned and informal settlements in the city. Unauthorised colonies (UAC) is one form of such informal housing which has been growing at an unprecedented rate, hence becoming a reflection of ineffective urban planning in the city. As an area that needs attention to ensure sustainable housing in the city, this paper attempts to flag the economic implications of such an informality in order to shift the attention of policy makers in this direction. In addition to this, this paper delves into the institutional aspect of unauthorised colonies to understand the depth of the problem. The paper reports the results from a pilot survey of five selected colonies to bring out significant insights with regard to certain socio-economic factors. Although the survey was conducted well before the recent ‘National Capital Territory of Delhi (Recognition of Property Rights of Residents in Unauthorised Colonies) Act, 2019’ that was passed in Parliament to confer ownership rights to Delhi’s UAC residents, this paper discusses the potential impact of this bill and the gaps that prevail in its structure.

To address the problem of housing shortage in urban India, the government approved a massive national housing scheme “Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana-Urban” (PMAY(U)) in June 2015. The scheme aims to construct about one crore affordable houses in the urban areas with a slogan ‘Housing for All by 2022’. In this paper, an attempt has been made to understand the impact of the PMAY(U) scheme on the overall employment generation (both through direct and indirect channels). The study uses Detailed Project Reports for hills and plains as well as the Analysis of Rates, 2018 to estimate the direct employment generation, and Input-Output Analysis indirect employment estimation. The overall employment generation is estimated considering the number of houses grounded (both completed as well as under construction) in all four verticals of the scheme. The analysis based on secondary data reveals that the PMAY(U) programme has made a significant impact on employment generation in the economy with important implications for household welfare and overall economic growth of the country.

This paper is based on the premise that good governance and policy design must be informed by sound economic principles since policies create incentives that influence behaviour of the agents and agencies, leading them to take actions that in turn lead to outcomes. Such outcomes when undesired, can distort the respective markets. Indeed, policies in the name of the poor have often led to repositioning of ‘agents and agencies’ that lead to situations that ultimately harm the interests of the poor. Hence, we believe that upon noticing the undesired outcomes a critical evaluation of the underlying policy framework is paramount to deal with the root cause instead of symptomatic treatment. As an illustration of the above argument, we scrutinise the case of an important segment of housing market viz., cessed-buildings in Mumbai that came about as an outcome of the Rent Control Act 1947 and its surrounding offshoots/tributaries.

Urban flooding, one of the many risks and threats that climate change is likely to enhance, renders large areas of cities in entirely uninhabitable conditions and damages infrastructure. It also directly affects the well-being of people lacking access to adequate shelter and basic infrastructure, especially of the urban poor living in precarious housing conditions in untenable areas resulting in loss of assets, housing, social infrastructure and livelihoods and even resulting in displacements (many times). Such negative impacts further exacerbate the existing vulnerabilities of low-income urban communities. Through a comparative impact assessment of flooding on the low-income residents living in two housing typologies – formal public housing and informal settlements in cities of Ahmedabad and Surat in Gujarat state; this paper argues that formal public housing ameliorates the vulnerability and exposure of residents, as compared to those living in informal settlements.

The vast typology of housing in the lexicon of urban planning is not only suggestive of various forms of calibrated illegalities but also reflects upon the differential citizenship in megacities of the global South. The peripheral region called Narela in the north of Delhi, at a distance of approximately 40 km from the core, witnessed a basti resettlement project accompanied by industrial relocation. Now industrial migrant workers constitute a major part of the population of this region. This paper explores different sides of the housing infrastructure in the industrial region, arguing that housing is a realm where migrant workers in urban areas are constantly arranging, forging and organising their relations of social reproduction which affects relations of production in informal employment. Hence the failure of supplementing housing needs to the EWS category, as suggested in Master Plans, leads to destruction of social lives of industrial workers and restricts the ways of labour response. The intertwined relations of housing infrastructure with employment conditions, reflects upon the experiences of dystopia amongst workers and hence opens up the debate regarding the importance of providing affordable housing for workers along with in situ upgradation of bastis in the neo-liberal regime of development.

The housing market assumes paramount significance in achieving orderly human settlements in the regional context of any country. A responsive and well organised housing market promotes qualitative as well as affordable housing stock keeping the housing needy in view. It mainly consists of three sub-markets which play critical roles in the supply of factors of production or inputs like serviced land, financial services and construction labourers to promoters, builders and housing consumers. Despite these pivotal roles, India has never attempted to develop full-fledged housing market to promote housing development in backward regions. The present housing market has by and large limited its functional operations to urban areas, leaving behind a huge needy population uncovered. This development gap has not only marred the form of orderly human settlements for many decades but has kept housing poverty alive. However, recent public policy attempts have given a few favourable indications that would ensure supply of essential housing inputs in these regions. Village Panchayats (VPs) and Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) have been mandated to promote need-based housing markets in their respective regions. Also, roles of the other governments at national and sub-national levels have been clearly defined, keeping the poor and vulnerable communities’ housing needs in mind. This paper highlights the missing development discourse in India’s housing history and offers a few policy implications to strengthen the functional effectiveness of the housing market in backward regions.

Land is the most fundamental asset owned and managed by states and cities and is an important resource to generate revenues. India needs a robust system of land record management in order to optimise this resource. The land laws in the country are still archaic. The land governance system in India is conspicuous by the absence of scientific land record management. The changes in recording land details have not been commensurate with the change in the value of land or the number of land transactions. The Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM), launched in 2005, made the first attempt to reform urban land governance in the country. Given this background, this paper overviews the achievement of states/cities with regard to the urban land related reforms under JNNURM and identifies reasons for the differential success of the reforms. The paper also highlights the areas where concerted efforts are needed for full implementation of the reforms and showcases some of the good practices in the concerned areas.