Urban Update June 2017

Setting The Agenda For Tomorrow’s Cities

ISSN 2349-6266 RNI No DELENG/2014/57384

UrbanUpdate Volume IV, Issue II

JUNE 2017

Rs 100

Living With Leaderspeak

Dangers of

Disasters

The project is funded by the European Union.

Risk

Cities need to address urban vulnerabilities emanating from climate change impacts, out of control urban sprawl and unmindful consumption patterns. These trends have enlarged the dangers of natural disasters as cities have lost their original safeguards to mitigate the risks

The project is implemented by the AIILSG.

Magazines & Journals

Energy Efficiency

AMRUT Knowledge Management

Seminars

Project Management Customised Training

Sustainable Development Goals

Policy Research

Advisory Services

Swachh Bharat Mission

ECBC

Smart City Mission Capacity Building

Skill Development

All India Institute of Local Self-Government No. 6, F-Block, Bandra Kurla Complex, TPS Road-12, Bandra-East, Mumbai-400051, Maharashtra Tel.No.: +91-22-26571713, 26571714, 61805600, Fax: +91-22-26572115, Email: contact@aiilsg.org

Quality is just one of our strengths

AIILSG has begun skill development programmes in Rajasthan and Jharkhand. The institute with its 90 years of experience in the field of capacity building would impart training to youth living in rural areas of these two states to make them employable in various emerging sectorsApparel, Beauty & Wellness, Electronics, Healthcare, IT-ITEs, and Renewable Energy.

As per Mou singed, AIILSG will train 16,000 youngsters.

AIILSG is committed to build empowered India with skilled human workforce For Details, email at delhi @aiilsg.org

UrbanUpdate A monthly magazine published by the AIILSG — a project funded by European Union’s ‘Equi-City’ programme for India.

Ranjit Chavan President-AIILSG Ashish Deosthali Editor-In-Chief Director General-AIILSG Ashok Wankhade Managing Editor Abhishek Pandey Editor Ravi Ranjan Guru Executive Editor

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Kumar Dhananjay Consulting Editor Arzoo Arora, Pinaki Das & Akash Mandyal Editorial Assistants Meenakshi Rajput Graphic Designer Seemab Tasneem Marketing Associate Volume IV - Issue II Printed and published by Ranjit Chavan on behalf of All India Institute of Local Self-Government.

Printed at Artz & Printz, 208, DSIDC Shed, Okhla Industrial Area Phase-I, New Delhi-110020 Published at Sardar Patel Bhavan, 22-23, Institutional Area D-Block Pankha Road, Janakpuri, Delhi-110058 Despite careful selection of sources, no responsibility can be taken for accuracy of the contents. The magazine assumes no liability or responsibility of any kind in connection with the information thereof. The views expressed in the articles are the personal opinions of the contributors and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the All India Institute of Local Self-Government.

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The project is funded by the European Union.

The project is implemented by the AIILSG.

The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of the European Commission.

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EDITORIAL

Resilient cities call for prevention, preparedness, mitigation

D

uring the second weekend of May this year, there was a global disaster unleashed on people in some 150 countries including India. It was called WannaCry, a so-called ransomware, a malware designed to infiltrate computer systems and shut off access to crucial data.

Owners of the data could then get back access to their data by paying a ransom. At first sight it seemed like the stuff science fiction is made of. But with the start of the work week, newspaper headlines were talking about the potential damages this malware could do.

Governments and regulators including the banking sector went into overdrive cautioning their customers and prescribing a list of dos and don’ts. The event served to reinforce the fact that cities and communities are exposed to several kinds of disasters every day, some natural, many man-made.

Every year we witness many parts of India subjected to natural calamities especially during the monsoon months in the form of cyclones and floods. Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh describes India as one of the most disaster-prone nations with more than 50 percent of the population living in vulnerable areas. In addition we believe that the spectrum of disaster events has in recent years expanded and now includes many unknown, unpredictable and completely unforeseen challenges-such as WannaCry. How then does one build preparedness and resilience in communities to deal with these?Among the most effective measures would be one that focuses on prevention.

We need nation-wide campaigns and educational interventions to bring about a culture of safe habits. Fire is one area where good knowledge and effective practice of prevention measures will lead to safer habitats. Fire is largely a man-made disaster waiting to strike all the time in every home, office, factory and elsewhere. There need to be regular awareness programmes conducted in schools and colleges (even by including in the curriculum) as in factories and other workplaces about fire prevention measures.

In short, inculcating a culture of safety and loss prevention at all levels. Our national agency, the NDMA works to coordinate the effort. Other arms of the government, NGOs and corporates can play valuable roles.

So too for other potential disasters like floods which are caused in part, by choking of rivers, streams and other water paths by dumping. Adequate awareness building about prevention measures as also appropriate mitigation and responses during the event will create a well-equipped citizenry capable of measured response. State-of-the-art early warning systems, effective communication measures in an emergency, identification and protection of vulnerable settlements and building resilience into the architecture of upcoming structures and buildings will all help in our quest for safer cities.

We at AIILSG are working for capacity building of stakeholders at our National Fire Academy and its fire courses in many centres.

In addition our Disaster Management Cell works with various agencies to improve their capabilities to respond in an effective way in the face of disasters.

With rapid urbanisation, we believe that large populations will be increasingly exposed to hazards, some known, many unknown.

Cities will need to invest time, energy and other resources to build capabilities in the urban community and in institutions in order to prevent disasters and when they do happen, to respond effectively, mitigate their effects and rebound to normalcy quickly; in short, build resilience. For, ‘If you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail’.

Ashish Deosthali Editor-In-Chief dg@aiilsg.org

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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Quotes

PIN POINT BUZZ

We must establish model solar cities where the power needs are fulfilled solely by solar energy and give thrust to manufacturing of solar equipment, which will also help generate employment.

Rajasthan will develop 3169 smart villages, which will have clean drinking water, roads, sewerage system, Wi-Fi facility, e-library, sports ground, street lights and health facilities. This comes along the lines of smart cities project.

Narendra Modi Prime Minister, India

Rajendra Rathore Minister of State(Rajasthan) Rural Development and Panchayati Raj

Carl Pope‫‏‬ Senior Adviser to UN Envoy for Cities and Climate @CarlPope

The threats of climate change can be mitigated through city-level action

Jim Kenney Mayor of Philadelphia @PhillyMayor

I’m joining 99 other mayors & pledging to transition Philadelphia toward 100% clean energy #Mayors4CleanEnergy

Chris Bruntlett‫‏‬ Co Founder Modacity @modacitylife

The 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) require member states to address the social, economic and environmental dimensions of sustainable development in a balanced manner. Their implementation must embody the principles of inclusiveness, integration and ‘leaving no one behind’.”

Sweden has suggested a Common Plan of Action for applying its expertise and technology in promoting sustainable and greenfriendly public transport solutions besides solid waste management in smart cities (in India)

Antonio Guterres United Nations Secretary-General

Ann Linde Sweden Minister of European Union Affairs and Trade

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With its car-free centre and bicycle superhighways, Nijmegen shows us small, hilly cities can make cycling work too

UN Climate Action @UNFCCC

140 mayors of the world’s largest cities express their commitment to the #ParisAgreement w/ the Montreal Declaration

Inside

Volume 4, Issue 2

Inside June 2017

opinion

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Disasters in Hills: natural or man-made?

The rugged topography of the Himalayan mountainous ranges and the hilly belt of the northeastern region are highly susceptible to landslides. The topography of these regions amplifies the danger to human life and loss to public property as executing rescue and relief efforts become challenging. The hilly areas are most prone to disasters and need immaculate planning for mitigation and preventive measures

one on one

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Varanasi will be among cleanest cities soon In an interview with Urban Update, Ram Gopal Mohle, Mayor of Varanasi seems confident that the ‘oldest and unique city’ will soon be amongst the cleanest cities in the country

Cover story

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Article

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The magic our Cities Need Cities beckon the dreamers of every generation. The fortune seeker, the job hunter, the village artisan or a young student wanting quality education to build a career. Cities in India, like everywhere else, anchored many dreams, some came good, some could not but once having arrived, not many went back to their village

RegularS

6 8 10 11, 23

Pin Point Equi-City Newscan Events

15 28 46

Living With Risk

Cities need to address urban vulnerabilities emanating from climate change impacts, out of control urban sprawl and unmindful consumption patterns. These trends have enlarged the dangers of natural disasters as cities have lost their original safeguards to mitigate the risks. Every city needs to develop an infallible strategy to ensure safety of its resources and more importantly, of its citizens

LEADerspeak

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Dangers of Disasters Natural disasters have not been just causing loss to human lives but also inflicting huge damage to the economy in cities worldwide.

Natural disasters around the globe have resulted in economic losses of roughly USD 7 trillion since 1900, according to a recent report. With climate change and more people migrating to cities, urban local bodies need to chalk out a foolproof, resilient strategy to trim down the long term impacts of disasters on economic growth and lessen their consequences on buzzing urban life in cities in India

Velo-city City Images Numerographs Urban Agenda

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Temple City Varanasi Varanasi is struggling between modernity and tradition. Old voices are crying that we must preserve, new voices are saying we must change.

Will the city find a mid path is the question

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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feature | Equi-City

A Look at the City’s Administrative Efficiency Equi-City project in Nagpur city is moving towards spreading awareness in the city through various workshops and programmes having a focus on increasing efficiency and inclusive growth. The team has had elaborated discussions with the officials about the administrative efficiency in NMC and its sustainable goals

E

nsuring efficient, responsive, accountable and transparent governance at each level improves service delivery. This requires effective implementation of policies, laws and programmes in the city. Strong monitoring mechanisms, active citizen participation, convergence of Government institutions and programmes and capacity building of service delivery personnel can help the delivery of pro-poor services.

Cities’ sustainable goals

Government of India’s 12th Five Year Plan with its focus on faster and more inclusive growth articulates the need for improving implementation, accountability and service delivery.

In support of the national priorities, Equi-City is focusing on strengthening governance systems and key government schemes with a view to enhance the realization of the rights of marginalized groups, especially women and children, sanitation and sewerage, solid waste management and town planning. Equi-City therefore aims to develop a checklist of indicators to measure administrative efficiency and accountability.

For comparison and goal setting an organization needs to evaluate its performance; measurement of performance has always related to its mission and activities as well as the

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environment in which it is operating.

It is fairly straightforward for business organizations to measure performance because the sole criterion is well defined and easy to measure goal of maximizing profit. This is based on monetary terms and as such provides a clear and simple basis for comparison and evaluation.

In contrast, performance measures for organization whose purpose of existence is other than profit are open for deliberation. Although inputs may generally take monetary form, the outputs are not readily measurable in monetary terms and further have a value base where profit maximization may not be the ultimate goal for

existence. This is reason enough to be careful in exploring the concept of efficiency in the world of public administration.

Different perspectives on efficiency over the decades exist.People have discussed the topic of efficiency along two major distinctions; also, it has always been subject to how the duties of government are defined. At one point in time, it was just to increase output; afterward, it was defined along pure business lines; and later on, an element of value was added to cover the expectations of citizens as the most significant part of public goods and services.

Equi-City team in discussion with the senior municipal official in Nagpur Municipal Corporation

Sneak peek into public administration

One of the imperatives of public administration is the achievement of efficiency at all levels. Public organizations like NMC are responsible to provide the necessary public goods and services to the citizens but that too without any discrimination specifically based on affordability. Hence, the multi-dimensional objectives of public administration demand that performance not only is limited to mere cost–benefit analysis but also incorporates the essential element of providing value to citizens. In the present era where scarce resources have become even scarcer, it is important to visit the historic viewpoints on efficiency in public administration and attempt to foresee its future. EquiCity looks into efficiency as defined in public administration over the years and attempts to predict its meaning and role in the future in this field.

It is predicted that advancement in technology will have tremendous impact that will influence the evolution of public administration as a dynamic field.

Public administration is traditionally grounded in the achievement of efficiency in the work of public departments in pursuance of goals related to provision of public goods and services. Therefore, efficiency finds a permanent place in the study of public administration and the work of government and hence is included as an important theme of training in the project implementation. A common definition of efficiency is embedded in more technical terms whereby it is a measure of the ratio of output to input. This is also known as technical efficiency (Rutgers & van der Meer, 2010); it is acceptable when we are dealing within a system of wellquantifiable measures of inputs and outputs. However, efficiency takes on a whole new perspective when we try to study it in an environment of traditionally measured quantities in a system that is heavily based on values, inspirations, and human perceptions.

This addition of “value� dimension

gives a unique perspective to efficiency in public administration.

Work culture

Equi-City has also explored the working culture and trends inside the municipal corporation to have an idea about the administrative efficiencies inside the office and also the working culture in NMC. In present times, implementing e-governance has brought unprecedented efficiencies in the work of city government to serve citizens.

This has not only reduced the time (think efficiency) in communication but also made governments more accountable. People born and raised in a technologically advanced society may not be able to appreciate the efficiencies in public services brought by technology as much as a person from the developing part of the world. For example, department of motor vehicles processes and issues driving licenses within few minutes and all it takes is making an online appointment and one visit to the department. In contrast, just imagine the (in) efficiency in a manual setup for the issuance of driving licenses; this procedure only included wastage of time that the citizen and official can best devote to something more productive. As long as there is systems approach, there will be need for making that system efficient. Citizens are more educated and aware while public administrators have state of the art technology at their disposal; together a future is possible where technology and values work for a better future.

Whatever changes might come in the nature of family, economy, or organizations in the future, public administration can draw on its decades of experience to generate solutions.

The challenge is not that internal and external environment will change; rather, it lies in taking technological advancements and societal changes side by side in pursuance of public service. No doubt new technologies will bring challenges, but as always, there would be inbuilt potential to facilitate solutions. For example, heavy reliance on fossil fuels increased

One of the imperatives of public administration is the achievement of efficiency at all levels.

Public administration is traditionally grounded in the achievement of efficiency in the work of public departments in pursuance of goals related to provision of public goods and services. Equi-City looks into efficiency as defined in public administration over the years and attempts to predict its meaning and role in the future in this field

its demand and depleted its sources at much faster rates. The resulting efforts are technology- as well as valuebased, focused on finding renewable resources as well as taking stringent sustainability measures. Running governments efficiently within this new dynamics requires a balance in the use of information and communication technologies and human resource development. Therefore to pursue goals of public administration, and run effective administration it is essential to generate solutions for the overlying problems and move towards a more effective and productive system.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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NEWSCAN

India ranked second in renewable energy attractiveness index New Delhi: India has moved up to the second spot from third position in this years Renewable Energy (RE) country attractiveness index released

by Ernst & Young (EY).

According to the statement, India continued its upward trend in the index to second position with the government programme to build 175 GW in RE generation by 2022 and to have RE account for 40% of installed capacity by 2040.

The country has added more than 10GW of solar capacity in the last three years starting from a low base of 2.6 GW in 2014, it said. “In the medium term, as RE penetration rates increase, the government will have to turn its attention to the ability of India’s grid to manage intermittent renewables, especially around the evening peak, when solar availability falls away,” Somesh Kumar, Partner & Leader, Power & Utilities, EY India, said in the statement.

“The cost and availability of energy storage technology could dictate how close India gets to meeting its renewable targets. Meanwhile, India’s regulators must be mindful of the erosion of electricity market peaks caused by growing volumes of renewables and storage - this can

undermine the economics of thermal power plants, risking the stability of the system as a whole”, he added.

The report also noted that the Indian government needs to increase compliance with the Renewable Purchase Obligation (RPO) as well as ensure that India’s distribution companies, many of which are financially distressed, have the capacity to continue to purchase renewable electricity, especially if bid prices level off or rise. Also, the government’s additional emphasis on Photo Voltaic (PV) parks will help to plug the gap, but it needs to do more to encourage rooftop solar installations, it said.

The report cites that China, which

Measurement of Liveability Index of cities to begin next month New Delhi: While addressing a workshop organised by World Bank on improving accountability for local governments, Rajiv Gauba Secretary, Urban Development said, “Ministry of Urban Development will launch measuring of Liveability Index of cities next month based on indigenously evolved Index”.

To assess the cities, Ministry of Urban Development has come up with a detailed document on “Methodology

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for Collection and Computation of Liveability Standards in Cities” for the benefit of states and cities. The Ministry will assess Liveability Standards of 140 cities in which 53 cities are with population of one million. To select the agency which will carry out the assessment based on the parameters decided by the Ministry, bids has already been invited.

According to the Ministry 15 core parameters on which cities will be

has been ranked first in the index, and India have surpassed the US, which fell for the first time since 2015 to third place in the ranking of top 40 countries, follows a marked shift in the US policy under the new administration.

The report identifies the US government’s executive orders to rollback many of the past administration’s climate change policies, revive its coal industry and review the Clean Power Plan as key downward pressures on renewable investment attractiveness.

Kazakhstan (37), Panama (38) and the Dominican Republic (39) have all entered the index for the first time, it added. assessed. Cities will be ranked based on Liveability Index that would cover a total of 79 aspects.

Rajiv Gauba said, “A sense of healthy competition is being promoted among cities and towns in the country to focus their attention on improving governance and infrastructure availability”. He further said that more than providing funds to state and city governments, MoUD’s priority is for incentivizing implementation of reforms that have a far reaching impact on governance and service delivery.

EVENT

Infra Conclave 2017

Innovating Infrastructure NEW DELHI: The Association of Infrastructure Industry organised a two-day Conclave on ‘Transformation of Infrastructure in India’ on June 15-16 at New Delhi.

The Conclave provided an active forum for an inclusive dialogue among all stakeholders and a platform for implementing key initiatives in the infrastructure development domain. The Conclave was based on the idea of “actionable intelligence” withthe objective of transforming infrastructure, by bringing experts from various facets of infrastructureindustry such as power, healthcare, waste management, sanitation and urban transport.

Dr PR Swarup, Director General, Construction Industry Development Council (CIDC); Vivek Chawla, CEO, Emami Cements, Sarika P Bhatt, independent Architecture and Planning professional, were among the speakers at the event.

Ved Mani Tiwari, President and COO of Sterlite Industries,in his welcome address, emphasised on the crucial role of infrastructure, and the urgent need

Sarika P Bhatt

to integrate infrastructure with human tactics to produce happiness, with the main focus on sustainability.

PR Swarup, Director General, CIDC spoke on ‘Sustaining our Ecosystem & Building Healthy cities’.He highlighted the shortage of competent engineers in the country, despite producing over 1.6 million engineers each year.

Speaking during the discussion on ‘Active Mobility- Road Map for the Future’, Sarika P Bhatt brought to light the stark dichotomy of car users, which constitute only 9 per cent of the total commuters on the road and yet the policies of the government remain focussed on them. On raising a question to the audience, she found that only two people out in the entire audience had used public transport, highlighting the fact that despite its availability, public transport is not the first choice.

She added that “all metros have parking spaces for cars and two wheelers, but there is no provision for parking cycles.” “If we have to encourage cycling, all metro stations should have a facility for parking bicycles, as it is an environment friendly mode of transport and will promote healthy lifestyles also”.

A few solutions which were offered by the panellists were: construction of long Sarika P Bhatt brought to light the stark dichotomy of car users, which constitute only 9 per cent of the total commuters on the road and yet the policies of the government remain focussed on them. She added that “all metros have parking spaces for cars and two wheelers, but there is no provision for parking cycles.” “If we have to encourage cycling, all metro stations should have a facility for parking bicycles, as it is an environment friendly mode of transport and will promote healthy lifestyles also”

and durable roads, using ecologically sustainable technologies, going on a “road diet” and making streets inclusive by using more public transport, to let the private entrepreneurs take an active part in developing roads, smart traffic management and providing ‘accessible mobility’.

Vineeta Hariharan, Chief Program Manager, National Rurban Mission (NRuM), the sole speaker on ‘Empowering Bharat thus Building Strategic Rural Communes’ clarified the, misnomer that India is urbanising; 68% of our population is still rural.

The development of rural clusters into Rurban villages has been pioneered by the Shyama Prasad Mukherjee National Rurban Mission, which received the cabinet’s assent on September 16, 2015.

It provides an objective mechanism for selecting villages and focuses on the development of tribal areas.

While discussing smart villages, Rajiv Ranjan Guru, Mission Director, Innovoir, said, “the urgent need is to create independent infrastructure in villages, rather than depending on what is done by the government to develop rural areas; the need is to integrate community participation with private entrepreneurs and build economically self-sufficient villages and bring in innovative ideas which help them build themselves”. Panellists identified rural infrastructureas ‘connectivity’, ‘opportunity’ and ‘education’. Speaking on the occasion, Anuradha Das of AIILSG highlighted the significance of connectivity and sanitation for rural women, majority of who want to educate their children, as a result of which their children will go to the cities.

Further, discussions on ‘Power’ focussed on making renewable energy more affordable for small enterprises and to achieve goals by working back from where one wants to reach.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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BRIEFS

NEWSCAN

Thin plastic bags to be banned in Goa Goa Chief Minister, Manohar Parrikar recently announced ban on buying and selling of plastic bags below 50 microns from July onwards. This is to fight garbage and litter menace in the city area.People will be fined upto 5000 rupees for condemning the rule. Parikar said, “The fine won’t be a meagre amount. It will be hefty. It might be up to Rs 5,000. We might give some relaxation in the beginning in terms of the amount of fine, but we are going to implement the ban strictly,” Parrikar said, according to PTI.”We have provided work stations to collect garbage on the highways. People should hand over their garbage at these work stations,” he said.

85 cities to be covered by Toilet Locator app by Oct 2

Through “Toilet Locator” app Centre has target of covering 85 cities by October 2 this year. Cities like Agra, Ajmer, Ahmedabad, Bhilai Nagar, Bhubaneswar, Dhanbad, Greater Mumbai, Guwahati, Jaipur, Jammu, Kochi, Vijayawada and Greater Bengaluru will have the facility. People with smart phones can download the application and can locate nearby toilet by tapping on Google maps.

The initiative was launched in Delhi-NCR in December, 2016.

Municipal Bodies can engage Quality Council of India (QCI) for mapping all the public and community toilets, Urban Development ministry suggests.

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Wen-je Ko, Mayor of Taipei (Taiwan) along with Hansa Patel, Executive Advisor (AIILSG) and Ravi Ranjan Guru, Senior Executive Director (AIILSG), at a meet in New Delhi. A host of stakeholders from IoT and Tourism industry were also part of the meet

NMC, NDMC to recover charges for garbage collection NAGPUR/DELHI: Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) is set to recover charges for garbage collection from citizens. The corporation has also initiated plans to take action against citizens who do not segregate garbage and the ones who pollute water bodies. Officiating Mayor DeeprajPardikar along with ruling party leader, Sandip Joshi announced the launch of the project in the city on World Environment Day. Joshi said that the NMC was planning to make the project successful in 30% area of the city within the first three months of its launch and in the entire city within a year. “NMC requires 11 lakh dustbins, two for each of the 5.50 lakh households. The costing for the same is Rs14 crore. NMC procured 2,500 dustbins and will distribute them on June 5 to mark the beginning of the project,” he said. Mayor PravinDatke said that the NMC hopes to generate around Rs20-22 crore per annum from user charges on garbage. Already, the central

government had increased the Value Added Tax by 0.5% to meet the expenses of Swachh Bharat Mission. NMC plans to recover the charges under Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM) from 2016-2017 fiscal.

Also, North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) recently proposed the implementation of waste collection charges. Citizens of the NDMC area will be charged for door-to-door waste collection. As per the proposal, user charges will be around Rs 50 to Rs 150 per month for residential colonies and will be higher for commercial establishments.

NDMC claims 100% door-to-door collection is not possible under the budgetary allocation. As specified in the bye-laws of the local bodies, the Solid Waste Management (SWM) Rules 2016 says that waste generators shall pay fee to the user for solid waste management. The current proposal suggests higher charges for higher classification category and lower for lower classification category.

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www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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NEWSCAN

GHMC proposes vermicompost units in hotels

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has come up with an idea to mandate a vermicompost unit in every hotel, function hall, big apartments and gated communities. GHMC mayor Bonthu Rammohan said the idea behind the proposal is not only to reduce environmental pollution but also promote usage of manure at households.

Recently the mayor inaugurated a biodigester at a private hotel in Habsiguda.

While speaking at the Telangana Hotels Association meeting, Rammohan said the municipal corporation would try to provide the vermicompost unit at a subsidised price to hotels and apartments under the Swachh Bharat Mission or other central government schemes.

“The cost of a vermicompost unit is around Rs 2.5 lakh for a 50 kg unit being used by hotels. The Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT), which provided the technology, has been asked to come up with small units of capacities ranging from 5, 10 and 20 kgs for households at lesser prices.

The vermicompost units would not only help the corporation to reduce the cost of transportation of waste, but will also generate bio-gas and manure,” Rammohan said.

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UN honours India as Disaster Risk Reduction Asia Champion NEW DELHI: Rajnath Singh, Union Home Minister recently inaugurated the second meeting of the national platform on Disaster Risk Reduction (NPDRR).

He said India has moved from disaster mitigation to risk reduction. He reminds states of their primary roles in disaster management.

“Multi-dimensional aspects of disaster related risks should be dealt with affirmative action,” he said.

Union Minister of State for Home Affairs, Kiren Rijiju has been conferred as Asia Leader for Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) by Special Representative of United Nations (UN) and Secretary General for DRR, Margarete Wahlstrom.

Rijiju was conferred as the first regional champion for DRR. Rijiju said, “This recognition is an onerous responsibility on India and in my personal capacity to make India, Asia-Pacific and the world as a whole safer and better prepared to deal with any disaster. ”We recognize the importance of including disaster and climate risk management as an integral part of developmental planning and programs to realize the global goals of sustainable development and poverty eradication,” he said. Union Home

Minister said India has been drawing the best practices around the World to improve its systems and processes for Disaster Management. Our national policies include mainstreaming of disaster risk reduction and development programs, besides community resilience building, he added. Singh said sustainable development was closely related to better disaster management, and efforts must be made to make all development initiatives disaster-resilient. India’s recent initiatives for increasing regional cooperation included launching of a dedicated satellite for South Asian Countries, holding of the Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (AMCDRR) 2016 and setting up of the SAARC disaster management centre, Singh said.

Women and Child Development (WCD) Minister Maneka Gandhi, Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Minister Radha Mohan Singh and ministers from Haryana, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh and Prof JagdishMukhi, LG of Andaman and Nicobar Islands, attended the session.

TfL to sign pact with Highway Ministry BRITAIN: Transport for London (TfL) and Ministry of Road transport and Highways recently signed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) which will involve sharing expertise on mobility and efficiency of the transportation system, as well as logistical issues such as planning and delivery. The agreement will also cover TfL’s experience in ticketing, providing information, financing, infrastructure, maintenance work, as well as promotion of the use of the public transport, a delegation member said.

Other areas of cooperation in the future are likely to include innovation around

buses. The London city transport system is considered one of the best equipped in the world, using a wide range of options from the Underground to the bus network, the Dockland Light Railway, trams, ferries and even a cable car (developed as part of the 2012 games related infrastructure).

During a three week visit to London, Gadkari included the launch of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI)’s first masala bond on the London Stock Exchange, through which it hopes to raise up to Rs 5000 crore (the RBI limit) to help fund investment in key transport infrastructure.

CITY IMAGES

Permaculture

Solution to sustainable housing

Development comes with a cost. It damages ecosystem.

If we could build houses that are in sync with nature, it will surely contribute to sustainable development.

Shagun Singh, a trained professional in sustainable design and an MBA, is building sustainable houses using Permaculture technique at Geeli Mitti Farms in Pangot, District Nainital Uttarakhand.

These houses do not need conventional heating or cooling system between 50C and -50C; thus does not harm environment.

These houses generate zero waste and optimize energy usage. They are believed to be more natural connecting to the wildlife.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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BRIEFS

For construction, mandatory to have environmental certificate

After forming a special environment committee to issue environment certificates, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has made it mandatory to have environment certificate or permission for constructions above 5000 sqm.

This Environment commitee will run background checks before issuing the NOC. The projects will be monitored even after their completion. “The initiative will ease doing business.

Simplification and standard operating process will speed up clearances,” said Anirudhha Pavaskar, a senior official of the building permission department heading the monitoring cell.

NGT announces Rs 1 lakh fine for dumping e-waste around Ramganga To save Ganga and its tributaries from e-waste, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) has announced Rs one lakh fine on violators. Mostly the e-waste is being dumped by several illegal industries in Moradabad.

“Huge quantity of hazardous e-waste generated from various industries is being disposed of in powder form at the banks of Ramganga in Moradabad,” Justice Swatanter Kumar said.

The Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) last month made surprise inspection in several illegal e-waste industries in Moradabad.

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June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

NEWSCAN

Over 5000 people sweep together, Vadodara creates Guinness World record Vadodara: Residents of Vadodara, the 10th cleanest city in the country, recently created a new Guinness world record with maximum number of people sweeping the ‘floor’ (single venue), an official said.

Vadodara Municipal Commissioner, Vinod Rao said around 5,058 people came together to sweep the venue - a bridge connecting Akota with Dandia bazaar - spread over one kilometre.

The record was achieved by participants who swept the place in groups of 50.

“This unique programme was organised for celebrating the city’s inclusion in ten cleanest cities and as part of the commitment to become the cleanest city next year,” Rao said, adding that cleaning exercise was witnessed by 50,000 people.

The certificate of the world record was awarded by adjudicator of the Guinness World Records soon after the event.

The large-scale event saw about 50,000 people in attendance as they cheered and rendered their support to the participants. “Most people sweeping the floor (single venue) was achieved

by Vadodara municipal corporation in Vadodara, Gujarat, and the attempt was witnessed by 50,000 people on May 28, 2017,” stated the certificate.

Rao said the programme was a tribute to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Swachh Bharat Abhiyan. According to The Times of India, municipal commissioner Dr Vinod Rao said “The idea behind organising this event was to encourage people to keep their surroundings clean.

Cleaning up the city is the duty of the VMC but keeping it clean is the collective responsibility of the citizens. Residents of the cultural capital of Gujarat have to inculcate the habit of cleanliness.”

PM Modi appreciated the city’s efforts and its feat by tweeting about the event.

“Vadodara celebrated its inclusion in 10 cleanest cities in a very inspiring manner,” he wrote, along with posting two pictures that showed a large number of people standing on a long stretch of land and sweeping.

In February, 2017 People in Mexico City made a record in this regard with a gathering of 1767 at one place.

Red bins for e-waste and hazardous waste Navi Mumbai: A third category for segregating solid waste, Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) has. come up with a red coloured bin for e-wastes. NMMC has placed these bins at civic body headquarters, Wonders Park and inorbit mall for electronic and hazardous waste which includes deodorant sprays, room fresheners and dead batteries.

On the occasion of World Environment Day the project was approved at Wonders Park in the presence of Mayor Sudhakar Sonawane, Commissioner N Ramaswamy, and Swachh Navi Mumbai brand ambassador, Shankar Mahadevan.

“Being a resident of Navi Mumbai makes me proud. Every resident should ensure that we keep our city clean by

throwing trash in the respective bins,” said Mahadevan.

Initially NMMC has placed three red bins at civic body headquarters in CBD Belapur, Wonders Park and Inorbit Mall.

The accumulated waste will be collected every fourth day by Eco Friend Industries.

NEWSCAN

ACME launches battery charging stations for electric vehicles

Chandigarh to have more trees and shrubs In the financial year of 20172018, Chandigarh Municipal Corporation will plant 40,000 trees and shrubs in which 10,000 will be trees and the rest shrubs.

“We have prepared a list of trees to be planted on various locations. Around 1,000 dead and dangerous trees were identified in the tree census. All such trees will be replaced,” said Krishanpal Singh, executive engineer of MC’s horticulture department.

According to the horticulture wing 12000 saplings of trees will be planted till the end of July 2017. Rest 18000, 7375 and 4000 saplings will be planted from July to September, October to December and January to March, respectively. More than 1000 trees and shrubs will be planted only in Mango Garden.

UP to have two new municipal corporations

Nagpur: ACME Group has launched India’s first battery swapping and charging station for electric vehicles.

ACME group said, “The EcoCharge Battery Swapping & Charging Station comes with the advantages like lowest operating cost, fast charging and swapping time less than filling fuel” Ola got EcoCharge Battery Swapping & Charging stations as pilot project at Nagpur city from ACME group in which 200 vehicles, including bus, auto and car all running on electricity. Ola has invested more than Rs 50 crore in electric vehicles and charging infrastructure. The first stage of the project was launched on May 26, 2017.

The Union transport minister Nitin Gadkari, flagged off this project. The group has setup swapping and charging stations at multiple locations in Nagpur.

It has plans to replicate similar swapping and charging infrastructure in

other cities of India to facilitate adoption of electric mobility.

To promote electric mobility, the group has similar plans to set up swapping and charging infrastructure in other cities as well. They are looking forward for results of this pilot project.

Manoj Kumar Upadhyay, Founder & Chairman of ACME Group said “We are honoured to participate in this project with OLA which is a great example of the Make in India initiative. Our solution delivers performance needed for anxiety free transport at the lowest cost which a common man can afford and at the same time it helps environment to be pollution free”. ACME is offering lithium batteries from its manufacturing facility at Rudrapur, Uttarakhand. These lithium batteries have intelligent BMS technology for electric mobility and stationary applications ranging from kilo watt hour to megawatt hour.

With the aim to provide better services to the tourist and for a holistic development in the cities, Uttar Pradesh (UP) Government has decided to merge the Municipal bodies of Mathur-Vrindavan and AyodhyaFaizabad. The two new local bodies would be MathuraVrindavan Nagar Nigam and Ayodhya Nagar Nigam.

According to PTI, the decision was taken at a state cabinet meeting, which was presided by the Chief Minister, Yogi Adityanath. Cabinet Minister Shrikant Sharma said that the idea behind the decision was to facilitate better provisions and amenities to the pilgrims.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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NEWSCAN

NMCG approves projects worth over Rs 1900 crore for creating STPs

Under National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG); Haridwar, Rishikesh, Vrindavan, Varanasi, Allahabad and Delhi to get hundred percent sewage treatment facilities with a new project

New Delhi: Giving another major push to Namami Gange programme National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) has approved projects worth Rs 1,900 crore for the creation of sewage treatment infrastructure in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and UT of Delhi.

With approval of these projects hundred percent sewage treatment facilities will be made available for Haridwar, Rishikesh, Vrindavan, Varanasi, Allahabad and NCT of Delhi. These projects were approved in the third meeting of the Executive Committee of NMCG held in New Delhi last month.

A comprehensive project of interception, diversion and treatment of sewage in Naini, Phaphamau and Jhunsi sewerage zones of Allahabad at an estimated cost of Rs 767.59 crore has been approved. Apart from construction of a 42 MLD (million litres per day) Sewage Treatment Plant (STP) in Naini, the project also encompasses building up of eight sewage pumping stations among other works. None of the three zones have any sewerage schemes or any sanctioned STPs as yet.

These approved projects along with the existing ones would take care of sewage management of the core city of

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June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Allahabad bounded by rivers Ganga and Yamuna. The projects would also arrest flowing waste water of 18 drains into the rivers to ensure pollution free water for bathing at Sangam during Ardh Kumbh Mela 2019. With approval of these projects 100% sewage treatment capacity can be achieved in Allahabad.

Three projects of sewage treatment infrastructure were approved for Pahari sewage zone in Patna city of Bihar including construction of a 60 MLD STP and laying of sewerage lines at an estimated cost of about Rs 744 crore.

With these approvals, Patna will now have a sewage treatment capacity of 200 MLD. In the National Capital Territory of Delhi, construction of as many as seven prioritized STPs of total capacity 94 MLD in Najafgarh area have been approved at an estimated cost of Rs 344.81 crore under ‘Maily Se Nirmal Yamuna’ project that was initiated on the directions of National Green Tribunal (NGT). Najafgarh drain contributes around 70 per cent of the total discharge of the city into river Yamuna that includes a lot of untreated sewage. The locations where STPs have been approved are Tajpur Khurd

(36 MLD), Jaffarpur Kalan (12 MLD), Khera Dabar (5 MLD), Hasanpur (12 MLD), Kakraula (12 MLD), Kair (5 MLD) and Tikri Kalan (12 MLD). With this, all planned projects in Delhi have been approved.

On afforestation front, an allencompassing programme in five Ganga main stem States – Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal – at an estimated cost of Rs 61.5 crore has also been given a go-ahead. This would include sapling preparations in nurseries, soil work, plantation and care.

With this, NMCG has given go-ahead to projects worth more than Rs 4,100 crore during the last three months in the states of Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and NCT of Delhi. It may be recalled that Union Minister for Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation Sushri Uma Bharti is currently on a three week Ganga Nirikshan Abhiyan from Gangasagar to Gangotri to personally monitor the progress of Namami Gange programme. The Minister has reached Narora in UP and will proceed to Haridwar today via Bhrigu Ashram and Najibabad.

NEWSCAN

Pune metro rail to have solar panels on its top

Pune: To fulfill its energy needs, Pune metro rail which is being developed by the Maharashtra Metro Rail Corporation Limited (Maha-metro) is aiming to draw 65 per cent of its energy from solar panels.

According to Maha-metro officials solar panels will be installed on the metro.

While celebrating the World Environment Day in Chinchwad, Brijesh Dixit, Managing Director, MAHA-Metro said that they are planning to generate 17MW energy in the first phase through solar. According to Dixit, to connect important stops and points to the metro station electrical vehicles will be used and their batteries will be charged by solar power. “Adopting and integrating solar energy generation from project planning and design stage is our motto. In the phase one, we will generate 17-megawatt energy through solar. The Pune Metro

will become one of the very few metros in the world to get atleast 65% of the required power from renewable energy mainly from Solar,” said Dixit.

Dr Brijesh Dixit also said, “The dearth of timely public transport has made metro an essential development in order to connect the twin cities of PimpriChinchwad and Pune”.

Ramnath Subramniam, Executive Director of Maha-metro, said that around 30 per cent cost of running the metro is energy-related. The project will be a better version of its parent project, the Delhi Metro, which was the first metro rail to be introduced in the country, said Dr Dixit.

Dixit claimed that the aim is to lower the environmental impact by learning from the mistakes of the previous projects.

Switzerland to help Amaravati have smart buildings Vijayawada: The Project Management and Technical Units (PMTU) of India and Switzerland will help the Andhra Pradesh Capital Region Development Authority (APCRDA) to develop energy-efficient and thermally comfortable buildings in Amaravati. This is a bilateral project under the Indo-Swiss Building Energy Efficiency Project (BEEP), between Government of India and Government of Switzerland.

A day-long seminar was organised by BEEP for the officials of the CRDA builders and other persons related to project.

While addressing the seminar, Pierre Jaboyedoff, Senior Engineer and Energy

Consultant of the Swiss PMTU, BEEP, said, “Switzerland has developed stringent codes for buildings in the last 40 years. It also has the most stringent code in the world for solar protection buildings. Swiss has been No. 1 in innovation in the last five years and the expertise in buildings, practical application, and innovation that we bring can help cities like Amaravati, where there is a chance to introduce new designs and technologies.” He added, “This project would definitely influence energy efficiency of a city like Amaravati positively and the kind of technology that we advocate will comfort people here”.

PMC receives over 100 waste management ideas Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) recently held a meeting with citizens, NGOs and civic organisations on the management of city’s garbage and received over 100 suggestions on that. More than 250 citizens attended the meeting. Mayor Mukta Tilak said all relevant suggestions would be included in PMC’s comprehensive management plan which is being drafted.

“Similar meetings will be held at regular intervals to discuss the garbage issue, besides there is also a plan to appoint volunteers to deal with the issue,” she added.

Nagpur, first city to have e-vehicle transit

Nagpur becomes India’s first city with a fleet of 200 electric vehicles, including taxis, buses, e-rickshaw and autos owned by Ola, including 100 of Mahindra’s new e20 plus. During the launch of the pilot project, Road Transport and Highways Minister, Nitin Gadkari said “Promoting electric vehicles is our priority. We want electric buses, autorickshaws and other vehicles to ply in the country.

We are engaged in initial talks with SoftBank for loans at low interest rate for a green project. We want to introduce 2 lakh electric buses for public transport.”

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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NEWSCAN

Indian Railways to launch Double DeckerTrains for Business Travellers Indian railways new service Uday Express will connect metropolitan cities and start in the night and reach in the morning, so that travellers can save on hotel costs NEW DELHI: To attract business travellers Railways will soon launch double-decker train service equipped with modern facilities.

While addressing the “Smart Railway Conclave”, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu said, “The public transporter is looking to connect metropolitan centres through the new service, Uday Express”.

“We will be launching Uday Express for business travellers who would start in the night and reach in the morning so that they can save on hotel cost,” Prabhu said, adding that it will have improved amenities.Currently railways have undertaken a large number of projects to provide better on board amenities for passengers.

20 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

“We are moving ahead with a holistic strategy and we are doing it in a most challenging situation. Whether it is catering, booking tickets, cleaning of coaches, all these are happening in a smart way in the railways,” he said.

He said railways have suffered from underinvestment and lack of capacity expansion in the past.

“The expansion was not commensurate to the demand. Goods were moving away from the railways.

There was a huge gap in demand and supply. So we decided to come out with a holistic strategy to deal with it. We tried to implement projects involving laying new lines, electrification on a faster pace,” he said.

He said the challenge now is to

make better use of latest technology.

“Technology was always been there but now the scale has multiplied now.

Use of right technology is the game changer.”

The Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) which was languishing for years was made to progress rapidly and it is expected to be operational by 2019, he said. Highlighting the importance of investment in the rail sector, Prabhu said “Every rupee invested in railways has six time multiplying effect on economic and job creation sector.”

A huge capital expenditure of Rs 8.56 lakh crore was planned out for five years out of which more than Rs three lakh crore is being spent now, he said.

The Uday Express trains are designed to run at a speed of 110 kms per hour.

The Railway Minister said the Uday Express service will have improved amenities and will have large automatic food and beverage vending machines for passengers.

The railways plans to start the Uday services in the high density routes beginning with Delhi-Lucknow and the fare will be lower than that of the 3AC class in regular mail and express trains despite providing more and better amenities. Each coach will have a large LCD television screen, and passengers will hear the sound through Wi-Fi connected headphones provided at their seats, said an official from the Railways.

Currently, Railways has undertaken a large number of projects to provide better on-board amenities for passengers. Uday Express was one of the four new train projects announced by the Railway Minister in the rail budget for 2016-17. The other three types of train services announced by Prabhuare are Humsafar, Tejas and Antyodaya.

EVENT

Laying roadmap for better urban India NAVI MUMBAI: A three-day exhibition and conference – Municipalika, was held at CIDCO Exhibition Centre, Navi Mumbai from May 18 to May 20, 2017.

The conference discussed and brought forward a few sustainable city solutions to accomplish sustainable urban development.

Durga Shanker Mishra, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India; Maya Singh, Minister of Urban Development and Housing, Government of Madhya Pradesh, R Roshan Baig, Minister of Urban Development and Haj, Government of Karnataka, Pawan Arora, Director of Local Bodies and Joint Secretary, Government of Rajasthan, Sudhakar Sambhaji Sonawane, Mayor, Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporationwere among the dignitaries who graced the occasion.

During the inaugural session, Durga Shanker Mishra said, “The reason for the existence of Smart Cities is to improve the living standards of the people by using smart initiatives. There

are four major pillars necessary for the development of a city which are Institutional or Governance, Social, Economic as well as Physical and it is imperative that we focus on all of them.”

In his speech, R Roshan Baig, Minister of Urban Development and Haj, Government of Karnataka, said, “A city can only become a smart city when it has fulfilled certain conditions which can only be achieved by spreading awareness and changing the way people think. It is only when we deal with issues like slums and open defecation can we truly call a city, a smart city. Land being a scarce resource, new satellite town planning on available land like earlier KGF is one proposal Government of Karnataka is contemplating.” The conference also had discussions on wide-ranging topics such as smart and sustainable cities, safe and resilient cities, secure cities, healthy cities, green cities, connected cities, digital cities, integrated solid waste management, PMAY (Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana) and Geospatial

Solutions for Indian Cities.

During a session on safe and resilient cities, Prabhat Rahangdale, Director – Maharashtra Fire Services, CFO Mumbai Fire Brigade and Fire Advisor to Government of Maharashtra spoke about how they respond to emergency situations at high-rise buildings, slums and other crowded places in a city.

Another session on Solid Waste Management had participation from an esteemed list of speakers like Municipal Commissioners from Rajkot and Tirunelveli and other officials and experts. Both the commissioners enlightened the audience about the methodology being followed in their cities to manage waste. They spoke about the waste segregation procedure, mandates of waste management and rewards of following the procedures that have successfully resulted in management of waste in their cities.

Banchhanidhi Pani, the Municipal Commissioner of Rajkot, which ranks 18th on the Swachh Survekshan list of India, stated that they follow doorto-door waste collection policy since last year where the waste collection vehicle reaches the citizens twice a day.

He also mentioned using outsourced monitoring to manage waste for societies in Rajkot.

The other sessions discussed digital cities, Housing for All, roadmaps for smart governance in the cities and other topics about best practices and solutions for creating smart and sustainable future cities in India.

This unique event saw participation of over 170 exhibitors, from around India and the globe, displaying products, equipment, technologies, software and solutions for Smart and Sustainable Cities, encompassing many aspects of urban infrastructure development and housing and building construction activities. In addition to the various brands, the exhibition also included stalls of Smart City Bhopal, Smart City Raipur, Smart City Indore and others.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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newsfeature | Paris Accord

Trump exits Paris Climate Accord, US Cities stay with it Ranjan K Panda Convener, Combat Climate Change Network

T

he United States of America (USA) is the second largest contributor of global greenhouse gases (GHG) after China, and has the highest contribution to historical GHG emissions into the atmosphere. The Paris Climate Agreement, that was signed eighteen months ago, by 195 countries, including the USA, has come into a fresh controversy beginning June 2017 after US President Donald Trump decided to withdraw from this Accord.

In fact, the USA under President Obama, got a winning deal from this agreement and he could make the Accord work in favour of the USA. Many experts feel USA got committed to the agreement by not promising much commitments. It committed for a reduction of emissions by 26-28 per cent below 2005 levels by 2025 but all its actions at the moment would have only reduced emissions by 10 per cent.

Still, having the USA in the Paris Accord was important, as because the world’s fight against climate change would be at a great loss without this country joining in. However, as expected by most of experts and people who follow the climate change debate, the current president of the USA Donald Trump has just decided to withdraw from the Paris Agreement. Trump has decided to junk Obama administration’s Climate Action Plan (CAP) in order to support fossil fuel under guise of his

22 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

‘America First Energy Plan’.

The CAP, that was intended to improve energy efficiency and reduce methane emissions by 40-45 per cent, especially from the fracking industry, has now been done away with meaning the atmosphere will be burdened with an additional 1,000 million tons of greenhouse gases measured in carbon dioxide equivalent terms. The Clean Power Plan that was supposed to reduce emissions from power sector by 32 per cent and was blocked by the Supreme Court of America has now been put under review by the Trump administration. Junking it would lead to an addition of 200 million tons of climate destructive gases by 2025.

There are many more measures on the anvil that would offset majorly the climate fight of the world.

A shock to the world

The world leaders, civil society and others reacted with both anger and shock to Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Accord. The Secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) expressed its regret over Trump’s action and said it was ready to engage in dialogue with the United States government regarding the implications of this announcement.

The UNFCCC said that the Paris Agreement is aimed at reducing risk to economies and lives everywhere, while building the foundation for

a more prosperous, secure and sustainable world. It enjoys profound credibility, as it was forged by all nations and is supported by a growing wave of business, investors, cities, states, regions and citizens. We are committed to continue working with all governments and partners in their efforts to fast forward climate action at global and national levels.

European leaders immediately responded with more affirmation about climate action. In a joint statement, France, Germany and Italy said that they regretted the United States’ decision to withdraw from the accord, but affirmed their strongest commitment to implement its measures. They also encouraged all their partners to speed up climate action. In response to Trump’s willingness to re-join if more favourable terms were offered to U.S., these leaders strongly refused to budge.

“The agreement cannot be renegotiated as it is a vital instrument for our planet, societies and economics,” said the EU leaders.

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said that “the fight against climate change is ‘unstoppable’ and nations should stick to the landmark Paris accord,” adding “I am ‘deeply convinced’ that US ‘states, cities, the business community, the civil society will also remain engaged, will bet in the green economy’. In fact the US citizens responded to Trump with anger and their commitment to the

have vowed – voluntarily – to keep worldwide temperature rise to ‘well below’ 2 degree Celsius above preindustrial levels and ‘endeavour to limit’ it even more, to 1.5 degree C.

American cities’ strong message to Trump

fight against climate change.

A vibrant citizen driven initiative Climate Scorecard Project reacted to Trump’s withdrawal saying, “The rest of the world is aware that US President Trump does not get the Paris Climate Agreement. His decision to withdraw the United States from the Agreement betrays a lack of knowledge, not just about climate change, but about what it means today to be a country in an inter-dependent and inter-connected world”.

It refuted some of Trump’s claims that supposedly prompted his going away from the Paris Accord. “Trump states that America will lose jobs through the Paris Agreement, but studies show that America will in fact gain jobs through shifting to the cleaner energy sources needed to reach the Agreement’s global goal, such as solar and wind. For example, the US natural gas industry employs 362,000 workers, solar 374,000 and wind has 102,000 jobs, according to an Energy Department report. Coal companies employ 160,000 workers—a number which has been in decline for decades,” stated the Climate Scorecard Project.

According to Deon Terblanche, head of the World Meteorological Organisation’s atmospheric research and environment department, in worst case scenario the global temperature rise of about 0.3 degree Celsius can be attributed to US withdrawal. Under the Paris deal, agreed in 2015, nations

Todd Stern, the former US special envoy for climate change from 2009 to 2015, and who had led the U.S. negotiating effort from the start of the Obama administration through and beyond the Paris talks, wrote - a day before Trump announced the withdrawal in the atlantic.com, “Pulling out of Paris would cause serious diplomatic damage. The countries of the world care about climate change. They see it as a profound threat. They recognize there is no way to meet that global threat without an effective global regime. And they understand that the Paris regime cannot work in the long run if the world’s indispensable power has left the table. The President’s exit from Paris would be read as a kind of “drop dead” to the rest of the world”.

There are a dozen US cities that are part of the global C-40 group on climate change. These cities account for 25 per cent of US population and 30 percent of US GDP. In December last year, apprehending well about Trump’s exit plans, these cities had promised to stay with their climate action in a meeting at Mexico.

The Governors of California, Washington and New York, immediately after Trump pull out from Paris Accord, decided to form an alliance called United States Climate Alliance to provide a platform to all states interested to coordinate on climate action. These three states alone consist of about 20 per cent of US population and GDP.

The Mayors’ Pledge

Immediately after Trump’s decision, mayors of 61 US cities promised, in an open letter, to meet commitments agreed to under the Paris Accord. They reiterated their resolve to intensify their efforts to meet their cities’ current climate change goals, push

for every new action to meet the 1.5 degree Celsius target. They vowed to work together to create a 21st century clean energy economy. This was signed by mayors from cities including Burlington, Vermont, Los Angeles, Boston, Atlanta, New York, Austin, Texas, Salt Lake City, and Pittsburgh.

They declared, “The world cannot wait — and neither will we.”

Climate Mayors’ Agreement

As on June 12, till when the author could collect updates for this article, a total of 292 mayors from across the U.S. had joined the Climate Mayors Agreement. This list includes the country’s 10 largest cities that are New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Philadelphia, Phoenix, San Diego, Dallas, and San Jose. These mayors represent more than 60 million Americans from 42 states.

The mayors said, as reported in curbed.com, “We will continue to lead. We are increasing investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency. We will buy and create more demand for electric cars and trucks. We will increase our efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions, create a clean energy economy, and stand for environmental justice. And if the President wants to break the promises made to our allies enshrined in the historic Paris Agreement, we’ll build and strengthen relationships around the world to protect the planet from devastating climate risks”.

China, the EU and India, are the other three biggest emitters of carbon dioxide besides US, and they have all showed their renewed commitment to continue with the Paris Agreement.

Trump’s withdrawal seems to have made all others more committed towards the Accord. However, the response that the Americans themselves have given is tremendous.

The U.S. cities have certainly shown a new path to cities in all other countries to understand the importance of climate action and dedicate their energy for a greener urbanisation and world.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

23

COVER STORY | Disaster Risk Reduction

COVER STORY | Disaster Risk Reduction

24 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Living With Risk Cities need to address urban vulnerabilities emanating from climate change impacts, out of control urban sprawl and unmindful consumption patterns. These trends have enlarged the dangers of natural disasters as cities have lost their original safeguards to mitigate the risks. Every city needs to develop an infallible strategy to ensure safety of its resources and more importantly, of its citizens

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

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COVER STORY | Disaster Risk Reduction

Abhishek Pandey | Editor abhishek@aiilsg.org

U

rban India has witnessed a new era of change with introduction of new policy regime for improving sustainability and safety of their habitats in new and existing cities. This is not just reflected in the national framework of city development policies but also in the international goals and urban agenda.

The 11th Sustainable Development Goal clearly commits to making cities and human settlements more resilient and sustainable, while the New Urban Agenda, adopted in Quito in 2016, mentions ‘resilience’ and ‘efficiency’ over two dozen times. The idea behind formulating these policies is to ensure cities move beyond the unstable state of continuously recovering from hazards, and start foreseeing forthcoming disasters and prepare themselves accordingly. The challenge is visibly becoming bigger by the day as cities are increasingly turning into places of vulnerability, as illustrated by the growing number of urban dwellers in hazard-prone areas such as deltas and coastlines. Climate change is adding to the woes as it is affecting the rate of recurrence and intensity of weather-related hazards.

Indian cities are vulnerable to various kinds of disasters. According to findings of National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), more than 58.6 per cent of the landmass is prone to earthquakes of moderate to very high intensity; over 40 million hectares (12%) of its land is prone to floods and river

26 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

erosion; close to 5,700 kms, out of the 7,516 kms long coastline is prone to cyclones and tsunamis; 68% of its cultivable area is vulnerable to droughts; and, its hilly areas are at risk from landslides and avalanches.

Moreover, India is also vulnerable to Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) emergencies and other man-made disasters. Who can forget the Bhopal Gas Tragedy!

The most recent natural disasters relating to extreme weather events, compounded by urban stressors and sprawl, have inflicted much damage, and brought cities and surrounding areas to a standstill include Mumbai floods in 2005, flash floods in Alakananda in 2013, Chennai floods in 2015, heat waves in Hyderabad (2013, 2014, 2015), Kolkata (2015), Bhubaneswar (2013), and the entire Indian Northern and Central belt (2016). The list of such disasters is long and the climate change induced events would repeatedly bring such extreme events more frequently.

The cities need to be prepared for these disasters by having resources and skilled manpower for planning resilient urban development and also having resources to mitigate post disaster damages.

Vulnerable population

Urban land is costly and people migrating to cities without having any prior arrangement or surety of accommodation in formal settlements set up homes alongside nullahs, near land fill sites, river beds, coastal areas or anywhere available. Several instances of fire, floods, and landslides affect these habitats the most and it is reported across the country almost every year.

The communities living in these areas suffer loss to property and human lives because of their unpreparedness and having no safeguards or training to deal with them. Marginalized groups in cities such as women, children, elderly, migrants and people living with disabilities are the most vulnerable among the vulnerables. Have governments taken special initiatives to address their issues? The answer would be no.

Floods in the city of Chennai, almost two years ago, proved that. The elderly population in the city faced severe issues. According to a news report published in a local newspaper, senior citizens constituted a significant chunk of the total deaths in the floods. In Ekkattuthaangal, Lt. Col. (retired) G. Venkateshan and his wife Geetha died in their house because no one came for their rescue in time and they drowned in their house. Does administration in our cities have the data of such vulnerable populace? The profiling of such population is significant because they cannot respond adequately because of their physical inability or for whatsoever reasons. And, such data can be helpful in rescue operation.

All the city governments must profile such individuals who would need immediate help in the times of disaster.

Cities and disaster management

The recently released UN Environment report Resilient and Resource Efficient Cities addresses this issue. It responds to the commitment outlined in paragraph 71 of the New Urban Agenda, “strengthening the sustainable management of resources – including land, water (oceans, seas, and freshwater), energy, materials, forests, and food, with particular attention to the environmentally sound management and minimization of all waste, hazardous chemicals…in a way that considers urban-rural linkages and functional supply and value chains…” UN Deputy Secretary General Amina Mohammed stressed that “the Paris Agreement, the 2030 Agenda, and the Sendai Framework are intrinsically linked,” adding that “action in one area benefits the others.”

These are the international initiatives to make cities stronger for dealing with disasters but are our cities ready to handle these extreme events on their own? Do Indian cities have City Disaster Management Plan that is based on their vulnerabilities to different kinds of natural and

CASE STUDY | New York City, United States

How to maintain utility services in times of disaster New York City is currently one of the world’s leading cities in terms of investment for building resilience. This is in part a response to recent disasters: in 2012, Hurricane Sandy destroyed entire neighbourhoods and paralysed utility facilities and networks. According to Sanders and Milford (2014), more than 400 housing authority buildings containing around 35,000 housing units lost power, heat and/or hot water during the superstorm. New York’s exposure to environmental hazards and the prospect of continued population growth have driven significant public planning and investment in recent years.

Six months after Sandy hit the northeastern coast of the United States, the city government upgraded its PlaNYC strategy – initially released under the title ‘A Greener, Greater New York - and launched ‘A Stronger, More Resilient New York’ in 2013, a long-term plan to tackle issues related to climate change impacts.

Amongst its 257 programmes, the new PlaNYC includes initiatives directed to upgrade infrastructure and protect critical services to ensure continuity in the occurrence of hazards.

To protect its energy networks, the city has adopted a holistic approach to secure ‘grid resilience’, i.e. a system of electricity storage composed of interconnected micro-grids acting as single controllable entities that can operate in island mode should any individual modules be damaged. Building grid resilience involves upgrading power poles and increase energy storage to allow the reliable and

fast reconfiguration of the energy system when portions of the grid are down. Such power grid enables continuity of service provision by safeguarding energy against power outages and allowing rapid power restoration in case of disruption caused by a man-made or climate induced event.

Although enabling resilience, building such a system is financially expensive and can be considered inefficient in multiple ways. According to the report, “nearly two-thirds of every megawatt US power plants produce never does a bit of useful work. Some of it is lost due to the natural resistance of power lines. Some is lost as heat during generation. […] some is lost by design when utilities deliberately generate more electricity than they need and shed the excess”. As part of New York’s efforts to enhance grid resilience,

the system is capable of producing much more energy than is normally required.

On top of this, the system’s transmission lines are buried underground and often prevent potentially more productive land-use. Alternative or supplementary initiatives to address these problems can include the construction of photovoltaic panels and wind turbines to generate renewable power in sufficient amounts for redundancy reserves.

These are also decentralised technologies, so could be linked to separate micro-grids to further support modularity. In order to mainstream this type of activity, New York needs to combine visions of resilience and resource efficiency in its city strategy and translate it into concrete actions such as the adoption of regulations.

man-made disasters? The Disaster Management Act, 2005 mandates every city to build capacity and resources for mitigating disaster risks.

Some of the cities have worked in the direction. Vizag is one example.

The city administration with support from UNDP and USAID formulated CDMP for the city. The objectives of the project are to prepare the basic CDMP encompassing the elements of the pre and post disaster

management activities including capacity building. Further it describes how life, assets, infrastructure losses and adverse impacts can be mitigated and minimized with advance and proactive measures.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

27

Percentage of deaths by disaster type in the world (1996-2015) 800000 600000

9% 22%

47% 22%

9% 22%

748691

High Income

High Income

400000

Upper middle income 200000 Lower middle income Low income

239125

0

165869

150061 22295 17674 1472

722

357

Upper middle income High Income 22% Upper middle income

Lower middle income Low income

Lower middle income Low income

Deaths in numbers

Top five countries with most disasters (2005-2014) Country No. of all disasters Total damage ($billion)

China 286 265

USA 212 443

Philippines 181 16

India 167 47

1980

Are we ready?

68% of India’s land is prone to drought, 60% to earthquakes, 12% to floods and 8% to cyclones, which makes our country one of the most disaster prone countries in the world, according to statistics. But the question that come up is in a country where less than 50% of our cities have storm water drainage facilities, are we ready for major calamities

USA

Hurricane

$125bn

2010

%

Percentage of deaths by income group for all natural hazards (1996-2015)

2005

7%

Numerographs | Cities & Calamities

Chil

earthq & tsuma

$30 Team UrbanUpdate

28 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Source: NDMA, UISDR EM-DAT: The OFDA/CRED International Disaster Database, IMD Report

Name of Event Year Area Fatalities Floods/Landslides 2013

Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh

4094

Cloudburst 2010 Leh, Ladakh in J&K 257 Tsunami 2004

Coastline of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Pondicherry and Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India

10,749 deaths 2.79 million people affected

Heat Wave 2002 Southern part of the country (Andhra Pradesh) More than 1000 people died Earthquake 2001

Rapar, Bhuj, Bhachau, Anjar, Ahmedabad and Surat in Gujarat State

13,805 deaths, 6.3 million people affected

Super Cyclone 1999 Orissa Over 10,000 deaths Drought

1972

Large parts of the country

200 million people affected

2.3 million people have been killed by disasters

2010

2011

RUSSIA Forest Fire

japan

earthquake & tsumani

$210bn

pakistan flood

$10.1bn

2011

2010

2011

$1.8bn

Thailand flood

2000

Mozambique

2004

$45bn Indonesia tsunami

$4.5bn

flood

$0.4bn

le

quake ani

0bn

Economic loss

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

29

Leaderspeak | Disaster Management

Ranjit S Chavan President, AIILSG

Dangers of Disasters Natural disasters have not been just causing loss to human lives but also inflicting huge damage to the economy in cities worldwide.

Natural disasters around the globe have resulted in economic losses of roughly USD 7 trillion since 1900, according to a recent report. With climate change and more people migrating to cities, urban local bodies need to chalk out a foolproof, resilient strategy to trim down the long term impacts of disasters on economic growth and lessen their consequences on buzzing urban life in cities in India

N

atural disasters cannot be averted but their negative i m p a c t s on environment, people and public property can be mitigated. Cities are getting congested;and the proliferation of slums and population increase in low income areas are staggering issues. These areas are the most vulnerable to natural and man-made disasters.

And, in the present scheme of things in our cities, it is a fact that the most vulnerable people are the least prepared ones. It is visible in almost every post-disaster finding that the poor suffer the most because of having no safeguards at their disposal.

The marginalized sections’ exposure to disaster in low income countries is exacerbated by poverty, lack of early warning systems & readiness to handle the

30 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

consequences, and an absence of the civil protection mechanisms. Being the closest to the communities, urban local bodies can act as a bridge between the district administration, state government and local communities to make communities resilient and show cohesiveness in dealing with natural hazards.

Lessons from the past

The Indian Ocean Tsunami claimed almost 230,000 lives in several countries in December 2004. The disaster had left thousands of people homeless and bereaved. More than 10,000 tourists were also killed because they were there at the wrong time. It is among the worst disasters that India ever faced. The most damage was caused because of unpreparedness of the people living along the affected zones. The government also

did not have effective early warning system but local authorities and communities living along the coast learnt their lessons and worked to improve the system.

Technological advancements have made it feasible for us to predict natural disasters.

This information must be disseminated to the public so that they may not be caught unawares. With the warnings given, the public must also be trained as to what to do and what not to do during a certain kind of disaster to minimize loss of lives.

Community Based Disaster Preparedness training programmes need to be organized at regular intervals.

Tamil Nadu has tried many models for mainstreaming disaster risk management at all levels with focus on district and community level activities in most vulnerable areas. These models can be studied and wherever

feasible can be replicated for safeguarding the vulnerable populace. The vital output of these projects is multihazard risk management and sustainable recovery plans at community, panchayat and other administrative levels.

Cyclone is a frequent feature in the Bay of Bengal. Odisha and Andhra Pradesh have seen several instances in recent years. But the response of these two states to the cyclone in 2012 was inspiring as the loss to human lives was almost zero as the states announced the warning through multiple channels and even the most poor and the people living in far flung areas were informed and, wherever required, were evicted from danger zones.

Building resilience

Strong, resilient systems exist in high-income countries and help in bringing down the post-disaster impact significantly. Indian cities have witnessed almost all kinds of disasters; be it earthquakes, tsunamis, urban floods, terrorist attacks; and every incident has exposed some chinks in their armors.

Building a resilient urban ecosystem that can absorb the shocks of natural and manmade disasters is vital.

Disaster risk impacts in urban habitats are governed by a varied range of factors but the most important being the readiness of urban local bodies, local administration and community in the city.

There are evidences galore where natural disaster made lesser impacts where community proactively participated in disaster risk reduction training programs and took active part in rescue programs through resident welfare associations or other social groups.

Climate change, feeble governance system, and an increasing concentration of people and assets in areas exposed to natural hazards are driving disaster risk upwards, especially in poor and developing countries. It is important that every city in the developing countries adheres to Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 (see box) to make their city more resilient and safe.

Technological advancements have made it feasible for us to predict natural disasters. This information must be disseminated to the public so that they may not be caught unawares. With the warnings given, the public must also be trained as to what to do and what not to do during a certain kind of disaster to minimize loss of lives

7

Goals in Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030

To support the assessment of global progress in achieving the outcome and goal of the present Framework, seven global targets have been agreed.

These targets will be measured at the global level and will be complemented by work to develop appropriate indicators. The seven global targets are: 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

Substantially reduce global disaster mortality by 2030, aiming to lower the average per 100,000 global mortality rate in the decade 2020–2030 compared to the period 2005– 2015; Substantially reduce the number of affected people globally by 2030, aiming to lower the average global figure per 100,000 in the decade 2020–2030 compared to the period 2005–2015; Reduce direct disaster economic loss in relation to global gross domestic product (GDP) by 2030; Substantially reduce disaster damage to critical infrastructure and disruption of basic services, among them health and educational facilities, including through developing their resilience by 2030; Substantially increase the number of countries with national and local disaster risk reduction strategies by 2020; Substantially enhance international cooperation to developing countries through adequate and sustainable support to complement their national actions for implementation of the present Framework by 2030; Substantially increase the availability of and access to multi-hazard early warning systems and disaster risk information and assessments to people by 2030.

Source: UNDP

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

31

Article | Disasters in Hills

Disasters in Hills

Natural Or Man-Made?

Himalayan region have always been susceptible to disasters like earthquakes, landslides and floods due to its natural topography. The reckless developmental activities in the hills have transformed many natural disasters in to man-made events which cause heavy damage to human lives, livestocks and property Akash Mandyal | Editorial Assistant

I

ndia is a country vulnerable to disasters. The hilly areas are most prone to disasters and need immaculate planning for mitigation and preventive measures. The rugged topography of the Himalayan mountainous ranges and the hilly belt of the north-eastern region are highly susceptible to landslides. The topography of these regions amplifies the danger to human life and loss to public property as executing rescue and relief efforts become challenging.

Construction of 50,000 kms of road network in Himalayas, mining and quarrying are causing heavy damage to the natural slopes and to the environment. The construction of road networks on a large scale is destabilising the mountains. The impacts of natural disasters do not seem natural, as uncontrolled and unplanned human activities have made the situation severe.

32 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Uttarakhand flooding is the incident that explains why development in hilly regions needs to be planned well. The disaster caused enormous damage, destruction and loss of life. It also raised questions regarding our preparedness for handling such disasters. What is the government doing to mitigate them? Can our buildings, roads and bridges bear the fury of disasters? The construction of hydroelectric dams on a large scale is disturbing the ecology of all areas. The Uttarakhand power department and the central electricity authority have established hydro power stations in the upper reaches of river Ganga.

Uncontrolled constructions along the riverbeds, hillsides and the development of multi-storied hotels in sensitive zones to cater to the everexpanding needs of tourism have been identified as the main causes of these floods. To prevent such occurrences in the future the government needs

to focus on creating a robust pilgrim and tourist management system along with proper allocation of funds and regulations for tourism infrastructure.

If we talk about the Dhauladhar range of the Himalayas in Himachal Pradesh, it comes under the most sensitive earthquake prone areas of the country. After the Bhuj earthquake in 2001, which devastated the whole region of Kutch, the government of Himachal Pradesh had taken special steps and started a new authorityTown and Country Planning to regulate the construction activities in the Kangra region. Construction activities are rampant in Kangra, Palampur and Dharmshala and these have become huge concrete jungles.

Haphazard and unplanned buildings and residential construction is taking place unchecked. The policy of Town and Country Planning is not being implemented.

Kangra earthquake of April 4, 1905

is considered as one of the four great Himalayan earthquakes ever to have occurred in the past 200 years. It is estimated that more than 20,000 of its 375,000 population were killed and that one lakh buildings were destroyed.

If an earthquake of such intensity were to strike today, one can imagine the amount of destruction it can cause.

The entire Dhauladhar range in Himachal Pradesh comes under zone five; the experts of seismology have suggested earthquake proof construction for this region. However, the state government, Town, and Country Planning department have failed to ensure it.

In a telephonic interview with Urban Update, Tikender Singh Panwar, Deputy Mayor of Shimla, explained about the state and disaster management initiatives in the hills and said urgent steps need to be taken for ensuring safety of a city like Shimla.

The constructions in the hills are at a fast pace which is completely unplanned. What is the basis of these constructions?

These buildings are approved by the municipal corporations or by the Town and Country Planning department.

Somewhere there would be some discrepancies, for example deviation would be there, set backs are not there.

Secondly, are they disaster resistant or disaster resilient? I can say they are not. Who is going to decide whether a building is disaster resilient or disaster vulnerable? There is no agency that has done such work in Shimla.

For that, we have to understand the overall development strategy that the Himachal Government, the central government, and the World Bank are following. Actually, the World Bank is pumping in lots of moneyalmost 10,000 crores in Himachal Pradesh under State Road Project. The intention of this project is to widen the roads, convert two lanes to four lanes; but no one realizes that this increases the vulnerability for the simple reason that to widen the roads you have to cut the mountain and at the same time, you have to cut down the trees.

Actually, the strategy for transport and for mobility must be not widening of the roads but enhancing the mobility. It could be train; or the best connectivity to the mountains is ropeways. With this development strategy, people are being induced to buy more cars, because if you have more roads people will buy more cars. In fact, strategy has to be different; and this is also not in tune with our climate change strategy.

The present development strategy is extremely disastrous.

I would say it is very difficult to term a building that has been approved by the Town and Country Planning department as safe whereas a building that has not been approved to term it unsafe. Because there is no integrated development plan and there is no master plan. It is only through the interim development plan that the construction is taking place.

Are the buildings in Shimla approved by the Town and Country Planning Authority? Are they disaster resistant?

What steps should government take?

See, what I would like to focus upon is that we require professional agencies from the government that should draw up a master plan and that should decide which building is vulnerable and which is not. And then, overall strategy with some time frame has to be developed to make building resilient, strengthen it and also to have an overall development strategy.

For example, a big disaster is going to happen due to the roads and these hydro power projects. The day we have an earthquake and one of these dams gets destroyed then imagine what will happen. Imagine all the rivers in fact have become dumping ground for muck. Entire muck that has come out of the templehas actually been dumped along the river line.

Tikender Singh Panwar Deputy Mayor of Shimla

If disaster like Uttarakhand ever happens in Shimla, are we prepared for that? What are the plans for mitigation?

No, we are not ready for that. See, we have done what is called Hazard Risk Vulnerability Assessment in Shimla and the outcome of that assessment and understanding is that if an earthquake strikes during the day then some 15000 people are going to die in a day but if it strikes during night, then over 22000 people will die.

There is a plan to mitigate but then it is extremely difficult. It requires a lot of money. There is a City Disaster Management Plan, District Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) and the State Disaster Management Plan and Action but nothing to mitigate.

These plans are never made by engaging the people; these plans are made in some AC drawing rooms.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

33

Article | Natural Calamities

Urbanisation, Disasters & their Solutions Urbanisation is picking up at a fast pace globally; and the impact is visible in Asian and African countries. Concentration of economic activities, industrialisation, migration from rural area are all causing population influx in cities. According to UNDESA, it is expected that by 2050, around 66% of world’s population will live in urban areas

I PP Singh | Former Director India Population Project

34 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

mpact of unplanned urbanisation is in many folds, which is pertaining to overcrowding, congestion on the roads, water and air pollution. With pollution and population increase, problems of

liquid & solid waste management have also increased.

Urbanisation and industrialisation affect health primarily by putting impact on three things; one is change in physical environment which includes glass house effect, solid waste

Preparing to Respond ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦ ♦♦

Identification of Medical care personals Medical equipments & supply Patient evacuation plan Identifying the in hospital care Emergency store of Food/ Drugs/medical devices Ensuring the Workers Health & Safety Preparedness for Radiological, Chemical & Biohazards Psychological / mental health Care of Pregnant women (Delivery care & Neonatal Care) Public Health Information System Vector control Immunization needs Provisions for Potable water / waste water and Solid waste disposal Victim identification / Mortuary Veterinary services

acute or slow The severity of damage always depends upon the density of population in the area.

Roles during Response

Greatest need for emergency care occurs in first few hours. Searching for people, rescuing them and then giving them the required first aid is the initial role. Responding to public enquiries is the second most important aspect.

Four color code treatment working during any calamity situation- Red is for high priority treatment or transfer, yellow is for medium priority, green is for ambulatory patients while dead or moribund patients are put under black colored code.

To tackle any disaster there are basically four key principles– Preparedness, Mitigation, Relief (action) and Rehabilitation. Recently India has been honored Disaster Risk Reduction Asia Champion by United Nations. Prevention and promotion are the basic components of Public Health Care, which should be in the list of essential components of any health improvement service. Therefore, hospital and public health care agencies

Role of public health

This is to ensure the conditions necessary for people to live healthy lives through community-wide prevention and protection programs.

The fundamental obligations of agencies responsible for public health are- prevent epidemics and the spread of disease, protect against environmental hazards, prevent injuries, promote and encourage healthy behaviors and mental health, respond to disasters and assist communities in recovery, and assure the quality and accessibility of health services. Rapid urbanisation is one of the major reasons for high mortality and morbidity.

Recovery phase

This is the process by which communities and nations are assisted in returning to their proper level of functioning following a disaster.

Rehabilitation process has to be a priority, not only for physical disabilities but also for occupational / economic rehabilitation. Disaster situation has been conceptualized as a process with differing phases. In every phase, the information needed, the action

Common problems to all DISASTERS

EMOTIONAL NUTRITION SHELTER COMMUNICABLE ECOLOGICAL PRE EXISTING WATER BORNE DAMAGE TO DISEASES CHANGES DISEASES & VECTOR BORNE PUBLIC DISEASES UTILITIES

& vehicular hazards and the other ones are social environment and community health. Population growth results in multitude of problems in times of disaster.

So, disasters can be categorised into Natural and Man-made; these may be

have to address these quickly in any disaster situation.

The same varies site to site and with type of disaster. In an urban area, epidemics which are caused due to communicable disease is also called as a major disaster.

required, the problem encountered and people involved may not be the same.

People need to ensure safety by learning lessons of preparedness and disaster mitigation so that they understand the importance of preparedness.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

35

one on one | Ram Gopal Mohle, Mayor of Varanasi

In an interview with Urban Update, Ram Gopal Mohle, the Mayor of Varanasi seems confident that the ‘oldest and unique city’ will soon be amongst the cleanest cities in the country

S

Varanasi will be among cleanest cities soon In the recently concluded cleanliness survey by Ministry Of Urban Development Varanasi ranked thirty second. Who do you give credit to for this performance and what kind of initiative Varanasi Municipal Corporation took which yielded this kind of results?

The credit goes to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He has consistently run the campaign and emphasized upon the issue of cleanliness. This has resulted in greater awareness among citizens to keep the city clean. Citizens have become disciplined and they are spreading the message too. We adhered to the measurement given by the cleanliness survey. Tons of garbage

36 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

is generated everyday and we need to dispose them off. The corporation focused upon door to door collection of garbage in every ward. We also ensured that outdoor public convenience is available so that people can use them.

In Varanasi there was a serious problem of dumping garbage. We use to dump it in Ramona and there will be protest because it is also a residential area.

With the help of NTPC we found a new place and now we recycle the garbage and composting is also being done.

But there are challenges ahead. We have started the campaign to segregate dry and wet garbage. Varanasi is the oldest city in the world and is different from other cities. There is a floating

population of about two lakh people every day. There are areas like Kashi Vishwanath Temple, Sankat Mochan Mandir, Assi Ghat and others that attract huge crowds every day. So we are making all out effort to keep the city clean. But the main credit goes to the sitting MP and Prime Minister of the country who is leading the campaign.

And I believe in the next survey Varanasi will be in top ten cities.

But still if you go around the city, you find the heaps of garbage and municipal waste lying around, sewer lines are overflowing in many localities. One can name them. Why so?

As I said, Varanasi is the oldest and unique city. It has the oldest sewer lines. Population of the city has grown over the times but the sewer lines have remained the same. The upkeep of the city has been ignored by successive governments. Till 2014, it was a city largely ignored by the state governments. Sewer lines were never serviced and cleaned.

The former Prime Minister Rajeev Gandhi had once said that if we send one rupee only fifteen paisa is delivered.

That system is being changed and it is incumbent upon not only people of Varansi but across the country to realise and practice in their day to day life. Cleanliness has to become a habit and every citizen has to own the responsibility. I have already accepted the challenges about the areas you talked about. The development that is taking place in Varanasi while maintain the religious sanctity of the city, it’s a big task. There are things you cannot stop in the city like people coming to pay their Pooja at Kashi Vishwanath temple, watching ganaga aarti at Assi Ghatand so on and so forth. We cannot stop traditions but we need modernity as well. So it’s a work in progress. Now there is a synchronization between center, state and local leadership and results will be better.

As per a study there are more than two hundred slums in Varanasi. The living and sanitary conditions are awful.

What initiatives have you taken to improve the living conditions in those localities?

You are right but the population living in those slums is not big. Also they are mostly unauthorised. What we are trying to do is to make fresh houses for them and shift them there. In 2012 , when I was elected as the mayor, I have been consistently working on it. Its not an attempt to remove them from the prime location. We are trying to get them a better and bigger house with all the facilities for a better living condition. We are not doing anything for vote bank politics like earlier dispensation.

You may have secured 32nd position in cleanliness survey but the bigger question is how can the city be clean when the life line of the place Ganga is so dirty?

Ganga does not start and end at Varanasi. It travels from Gangotri to Gangasagar. The process to clean the river is on since nineteen eighty five.

Earlier it was a split of revenue between center and state to clean Ganga. State government had to contribute its share and it never happened. But this time central government has granted complete fund for the project. So the state has just to release the funds.

Now nobody can complain about paucity of funds including the officers implementing the project at the ground level. Ganga in Varanasi is no different from other places, be it industrial waste, sewer inflows and other religious offerings that flows into it.

I was coming to that point only. You have largely managed to control the solid waste but environmentalist and experts believe that intoxicants flowing in the Ganga from various sources is too harmful for life. You have not been able to control that?

As I told you Varanasi is a unique city.

It has an old sewer line. The sewer lines were laid in some fifty years back.

There were two lines, one was sewer and other was for cleaning clothes. This has not been maintained over the years.

If we take the example of Japan, water is recycled and recharged for multiple purposes like irrigation, car cleaning etc. but years down the line we have become unsystematic in Varanasi.

What we are looking at is practical solutions. There may be be scientists and experts but we have to keep people in mind.

The city is known as city of alleys. How do you plan to decongest it. It takes more than fortyfive minutes to travel four kilometers.

I am not going to reveal my plan to decongest the city. What I have in my mind is that we are going to ban some vehicles in some areas in the city. We

cannot break buildings to expand the roads. This is a historical city. We need to bring all stakeholders, including the people, businessmen, and daily wage earners on the board. We cannot move ahead without their consent. We cannot ask the shopkeepers and customers not to park their vehicles on the road. We need to make alternative arrangement for them.

We cannot stop business. What we are trying is to ensure that customer must reach the location he intends to, the shopkeeper must be able to park his car and deliver the quality services.

What we are trying to do is to ensure discipline and it will bear fruit.

Another big question is that you may have secured 32nd position but your points got deducted because you could only declare thirty five out of ninety wards open defecation free area. Where did you fail?

I could have declared it Varanasi as open defecation free but I tried to be honest. There are practical problems.

I live in a colony which is residential.

Rules have been ignored so lots of shops have started operating here. So lots of people visit this colony. There are parks. I cannot built urinals here.

If I have a small house and people visit me I cannot provide them sanitary facilities. We have made thirty five wards open defecation free and we are working in the direction to make the entire city ODF. It will take time but we are working in that direction.

We have absolutely no excuse. Its our government at the centre, at the state and at local level.

There was a proposal to make a pedestrian zone and a ring road to male it livable. PM also favored it.

What happened to that?

Talks are on. What constitutes a city?

It must have pathways. Varanasi doesn’t have single one. There have been massive encroachments. But we cannot uproot them without providing alternatives. We need to change the mentality and cannot plan till we change the mind set.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

37

Article | City Development

Cities beckon the dreamers of every generation. The fortune seeker, the job hunter, the village artisan or a young student wanting quality education to build a career. Cities in India, like everywhere else, anchored many dreams, some came good, some could not but once having arrived, not many went back to their village

Raj Liberhan Former Director, India Habitat Centre

T

he City has opportunities that the village does not offer. So people are moving in to cities in unprecedented numbers and there is no stopping this. It is happening in India, and also elsewhere in the developing world.

Sadly the cities are not coping well.

Many of them, in our country, just did not prepare to handle the volumes and stayed in a denial mode, hoping that the migrations would reverse in time. We have come to the present pass where the civic infrastructure is failing, environment has degraded because of negligence and life in our cities is under multiple threats. City managements are stymied, either with lack of resources, or lack of powers or plain lack of will to assert laws and regulations because the political leadership is short on vision. With little or scant investments in the civic infrastructure and poorly enforced development protocols, people met their shelter needs almost at will. The municipal bodies’ functioning without

financial and administrative support could only be willing spectators, as city after city lost its ability to accommodate the constant influx.

A flagship research project of the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate observes that, “the Indian cities are expanding outward at a rate that outpaces their population, and they are doing so haphazardly, without heed to principles of urban planning, without adequate water, electrical, waste management or transportation infrastructure and services and without a regard for the environment”.

According to this working paper, “the country stands to pay for this pattern of urbanization, if it continues, an enormous $330 billion to $1.8 trillion every year by 2050. For our GDP, this

The magic our Cities Need

38 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

translates into a loss of 1.2 to 6.3% shaved off annually”.

The GDP dimension is for economists to worry about. Sure, it is a loss of possible prosperity. But what is of deeper concern is the number of lives that are not able to gain their full potential of joy and excellence of ideas, and of human endeavor because there was no shelter, no schools for their children and no chance to have a future because the decision makers planning and expanding urban spaces did not foresee human needs with a visionary perspective. The city planners made poor or no choices for the growth of our cities and that too in a skewed order of priorities. Poor and insufficient housing and likewise, inefficient and deficient support structure is a familiar story in all our cities, indeed in most of the cities in South Asia. The resultant inadequacies have affected generations of lives as they stay embedded in poverty, and their hopes of escaping from this vicious circle postponed indefinitely.

The consciousness for healthy and productive living has universalized the quest for local governments to rise to better performance standards.

They have to manage the whole range of city needs: basics like sanitation and hygiene to facilitate vibrancy of the culture of the resident people.

Imagining the city of the future and adjusting the city protocols is now the foremost need of the hour for progressive city governments.

It would be good to get a fix on the emerging software enabling services and facilities which will alter the way we earn and learn, so dramatically, that cities will have to create a different ecosystem of transport, shopping and leisure, types of employment, healthcare, social networks etc. In a space of five years or so, Uber has become the largest transportation company without owning a single car.

Medicare will become a service at the doorstep for most diagnostics. Many of these developments are in currency right now and our cities have to start the adaptation and receptive strategies.

Constant resistance to emerging innovations will only slow down progress just because vested methods and practices have a lot to lose.

Increasingly we will see that ability to aggregate and converge ability to provide service will keep happening, possibly faster than ever before. The biggest emerging question is going to be about what should our children learn and how will the grown-ups earn their living from the opportunities that will arise from our urban spaces. The local governments have to arrange the environment to engage and prosper such enterprises rather than restrict or prohibit them. The electric rickshaws saw the combined resistance of municipalities and the cycle rickshaws, as also Ola and Uber. Eventually, a convenience will find its reception.

It is very much a given that cities of the future will need enlightened city governments. Indeed, the local governments will do well to create a department to anticipate and prepare for change of the kind future developments will engineer. Yes,

The future of success will be redefined for sure and we have to integrate the mechanized ability to monitor and obtain compliance of laws. Human beings are prone to be partial or biased or plain callous in the context of urban protocols whereas our cities need planning and aesthetic navigation through a structured ecosystem of participative and consensual public interest. Hence the need for an Urban Observatory like agency to record and monitor all development robotics will run our production lines, regulate quality and repair the faultlines. The future of success will be redefined for sure and we have to integrate the mechanized ability to monitor and obtain compliance of laws.

Human beings are prone to be partial or biased or plain callous in the context of urban protocols whereas our cities need planning and aesthetic navigation through a structured ecosystem of participative and consensual public interest. Hence the need for an Urban Observatory like agency to record and monitor all development.

True, our city management bodies lack the capacity to do some basic functions but the magnitude of the tasks compels much needed reforms in substance and form to lead manage the pressures of urbanization. These will continue to be relentless for reasons of human necessity. We need a city every two months to really receive the population flowing into cities for search of livelihoods and a life. If all they get is a concentration camp akin to living by the drains and sewers, it is an unforgivable failure of state duty.

There are no magical wands or sticks to wave but only to follow the Vedic wisdom, “Let’s do the right thing and good results will follow”.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

39

VELO-CITY | Varanasi

Kumar Dhananjay Consulting Editor

I

f there is a place that attracts people in life and death, it’s Varanasi. The sacred geography of the city that invites people for pilgrimage and activities within

it provides a life time opportunity. The city is certainly a mix of paradoxes and contradictions but abuzz with activities.

The traffic and roads are lousy but that does not deter the pilgrims who visit the city every day. The question is do we look at Varanasi just as a pilgrimage site. Certainly not.

A believer takes away so much from the place. From life to death, pilgrims travel along sacred routes and finally achieve the last resort. This is not symbolic. It has its own concrete expression. Varanasi is and has sacred geography and sacred performances.

People do argue that the city has several

Temple City Varanasi

facets. It has a holy river Ganges; it has Kashi Vishwanath and Sankat Mochan Temple just to name a few. What is important is that it is a ’sacred city’.

Everything that belongs here is still considered sacred and holy. However, the city is much more than religious beliefs and sacredness. It can boast of literature, singers, musicians and vedic experts in one breath. But, is the city losing its charm as a seat of learning, a cultural heritage?

Varanasi is known as the temple city.

If one moves around the city one comes across a place which is bestowed with culture, literature and festivities. Kashi

From tradition to modernity, tale of a struggling city Varanasi is struggling between modernity and tradition. Old voices are crying that we must preserve, new voices are saying we must change.

Will the city find a mid path is the question

40 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Vishwanath temple, Sankat Mochan temple and more than eighty ghats and not to forget the Ganges and the Banaras Hindu University which is the life line of the city. The city wakes up with morning aarti at Anand Kannan and finishes with the rituals at Assi Ghat at night; but it does not end there.

Thousands of people throng the two famous temples Kashi Vishwanath and Sankat Mochan temple everyday.

But sadly the tradition is decaying and modernity is taking precedence.

The city that boasted a rich heritage in literature, music and even in astrology

Indeed there is a lack of cultural activities and artists are fading away.

Tradition has to be carried in the family. When I came here, we used to sing and play together.

Keshav Maharaj, Bismillah Khan and I, and other musicians sat in a line and performed. The soul of the music is imagination but what is being served today in the name of music is what I call paper music. Which is anything but music Padma Bhushan Chhannulal Mishra Classical Singer

is fast losing its halo. The people who have been associated with the city and have witnessed its rise and fall now complain. Professor Vishambhar Nath Mishra of Sankat Mochan foundation says that “Varanasi had a rich cultural history, be it literature, music or religion. But that is decaying and the standard is falling. There was a time when people from here flourished in all these fields. What we are trying to do is to turn Varanasi into a modern city and we are forgetting that it’s an old city with culture and tradition. In the past the city could boast of names and they were unparalleled.

We have not been able to maintain the tradition. We have not been able to replace the people and it’s a dangerous situation. People are not being replaced and this is not going to happen in a day. This is going to take years; we need to wake up now. What we are witnessing is complete disaster and we need to stop it”. But he argues that not everything is lost. Even if the city is growing and modernity is fast approaching, he says “I am not saying that everything is over but we need to bring it back. Shahnai is almost over in the city, singers are leaving the city for greener pastures with the few exceptions like Chhannulal Mishra. We have not done anything to promote art and culture. It’s a fact that the family of Bismillah Khan is living in penury and we have failed to help them. These are interlinked. We are talking about high tech city and modernity. Varanasi is not known for them” One cannot bring people from outside and establish them in the city.

There are very few names which still inhabit the place like Padma awardees Chhannulal Mishra and Girija Devi.

Many have either left the city or have departed for their heavenly abode. But what is unique about Varanasi is that it’s an old but living city. It is not just about relics and old traditions. Traditions are being kept and maintained. One can argue and disagree with them but people of Varanasi are for them. One of the prominent citizens Chhannulal Mishra says that “indeed there is a lack of cultural activities and artists

are fading away. Tradition has to be carried in the family. When I came here, we used to sing and play together.

Keshav Maharaj, Bismillah Khan and I, and other musicians sat in a line and performed. The soul of the music is imagination but what is being served today in the name of music is what I call paper music. Which is anything but music.”

But not everyone is pessimistic. They are saying that efforts are being made and it is yielding results. The mayor of the city Ram Gopal Mohale says that he is at it to the save the culture and heritage of the city. He recounts the forty three day long Surya Ganga program. He called it a historical event though it did not get the kind of coverage it deserved. He calls Varanasi ‘a moody city’. He says that “Varanasi is a different city. Literature and music is what it is known for. Art is dying today. After Bismillah Khan there is no exponent of Shahnai today. We need to revive tradition today and we are working on it.”

The city struggles. Alleys are in chaos. Men fight with women, women fight with bullocks and kids make their way through, narrowly avoiding these fights. Modernity has brought misery for the city. Roads are dug up and it takes you more than ten minutes to travel a kilometer. But the spirit of the city lives on. These lines by Professor UK Choudhary, a retired professor of BHU and currently the Director of Mahanama Madan Mohan Malaviya Institute of Ganga management sum it up best. He says “people of Varanasi are vibrant. No matter what they do during the day but ultimately at the end of the day they go visit Kashi Vishwanath temple and deposit everything there.

Ultimately people drink tea and bhang and carry on. Life is not beyond that”.

For the people of Varanasi, life has not changed beyond alleys and for pilgrims too. This could have once been a city for Hindus to find enlightenment but is fast fading away. As the old generation of Varanasi laments, complains and seeks a rejuvenation of art, history and culture, modernity must find a place too.

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

41

Article | Local Government

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s an officer who has worked with the local government institutions in India for more than ten years, at national, state and local levels during my years with the Indian Administrative Service, I can be accused of having developed some insights in their functioning.

When the National and the Provincial governments in India were under British rule, the term Local Self-Government (LSG) meant the municipal and district local board administrations. At that time, there was no self-government at the higher levels

Dr Jairaj Phatak Former Municipal Commissioner Mumbai

and thus the limited self-government that was allowed at the local level after the Ripon Resolution was called Local Self-government. Even before the Government of India Act, 1935, which led to ministries in the provinces, the Governors-in-council in the provinces created after the Government of India Act of 1919 had a member in charge of Local-government. One of the most illustrious members in charge of local government in the then Bombay Province was Shah Nawaz Bhutto, father and grandfather of two future Prime Ministers of Pakistan, a distinction he shares with Moti Lal Nehru and Jawahar Lal Nehru on the Indian side. Shah Nawaz Bhutto represented Sindh, which was a part of Bombay Presidency till 1936.

After the formation of provincial ministries in 1937, the subject of local self-government was entrusted to a Minister. In his book ‘Local Government in India’, Sri Ram Maheshwari, the I.I.P.A. Professor, argues that the term local self-government should now be replaced by ‘local government’ since

the government at all levels is now self-government.

Democracy

In India, democracy is well-nurtured and can be said to have become a giant tree. Democracy’s advantages far outweigh its disadvantages. It would be a rare Indian who would question the continuance of democracy in India, although sometimes doubts are expressed about the efficacy of democratic institutions in handling the complex problems before the country.

About limitations of democracy, a quote from Robert Dahl is noteworthy.

‘Democracy cannot guarantee that its citizens will be happy, prosperous, wise, peaceful or just. To attain these ends is beyond capacity of any government.’

Dahl, however lists ten benefits of democracy that make it more desirable than any other form. ♦♦ Democracy helps to prevent government by cruel and vicious autocrats. ♦♦ Democracy guarantees its citizens a number of fundamental rights that

‘On Local Democracy in India’ 42 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

nondemocratic systems do not, and cannot grant. ♦♦ Democracy ensures its citizens a broader range of personal freedom than any feasible alternative to it. ♦♦ Democracy helps people to protect their own fundamental interests. ♦♦ Only a democratic government can provide a maximum opportunity for persons to exercise the freedom of self-determination-that is, to live under laws of their own choosing. ♦♦ Only a democratic government can provide a maximum opportunity for exercising moral responsibility. ♦♦ Democracy fosters human development more fully than any feasible alternative. ♦♦ Only a democratic government can foster a relatively high degree of political equality. ♦♦ Modern representative democracies do not fight wars with one another. ♦♦ Countries with democratic governments tend to be more prosperous than countries with non-democratic governments.’

Dahl, thus, concludes that democracy

My experience with local government in India is that working with elected bodies gives a better direction to the efficiency of the organization in terms of right priorities.

Working without an elected body can give rise to what I would call ‘targetism’. The head of the department decides some quantitative targets to be achieved and the field machinery tries to achieve the targets without assessing how much benefit these targets are giving to the common man

is, thus, a far better form of government than others.

What holds of democracy at National level also holds good for local democracy! It is difficult to enjoy all these advantages in systems other than vibrant democracies. Larger countries need more decentralization than smaller countries so that decisionmaking is not too distant from the common man!

The next questions will bedoes democracy contribute to welfare, whether people are indeed happier in democracies, or does democracy contribute to faster economic growth.

The following discussion attempts to answer these questions with some references to local democracy.

Democracy and welfare

In democracy, citizens can articulate their grievances through their elected representatives. My experience both in Zilla Parishads and Municipal Corporations indicates that day to day grievances such as shortage of drinking water, outbreak of a disease, absenteeism among teachers or shortage of medicines reach the executive in the quickest possible manner through the elected representatives. This no doubt contributes to an increase in welfare of citizens. Amartya Sen observes: ‘Serious famines rarely occur in independent democratic countries with a free press. One simple reason is although famines can kill millions, they do not kill rulers. Kings and Presidents, bureaucrats and bosses, generals and police chiefs; they never starve.’

In Maharashtra, the problem of high mortality among children in Melghat in Amravati district was, no doubt, highlighted by the press. However, remedial action was possible quickly through the machinery of Amravati Zilla Parishad (District Council). During the monsoon floods in Mumbai, an annual feature, the local corporators (as the Councillors in Corporation are called) and NGOs play an important part in helping the municipal administration.

It is my experience that for quick remedial action, money needs to be available for units of 50000 to

one lakh population or within five kilometre radius, so that the relief administration is speedy. Thus, the unit of decentralization must be close to the populace. In rural setting, this may require strengthening of the Panchayat Samitis wherever the Zilla Parishad is the unit of decentralization like in the Maharashtra-Gujarat model. Wherever the Village Panchayats are large enough, like in Kerala and West Bengal, they could be strengthened.

Kartik Murlidharan, then of Harvard University, studied absenteeism among employees dealing with service delivery in developing countries. It was found that the teacher absenteeism was the lowest in Maharashtra and Gujarat, where the teachers are employees of the Zilla Parishad and the Village Panchayats monitor the schools through Village Education Committees.

However, among the health staff, the absenteeism was lowest in Kerala where the health staff directly reports to large-sized Panchayats with average populations of twenty-five to thirty thousand. The Village Panchayats and Panchayat Samitis in Maharashtra do not exercise the same kind of supervision over the Primary Health Centres as they do over the Primary Schools and this could be a reason why absenteeism of health staff was not the lowest in Maharashtra.

In the urban setting, welfare could be increased through strengthening of Ward Committees through devolution of adequate discretionary funds.

Democracy and happiness

Economist Jeffry Sachs has observed that democracy is good for citizens’ happiness. This looks quite natural since nobody would like to live under the constant vigilant eye of a tyrant or even a ‘Big Brotherly’ dictator. Sachs observes that the happiest countries are participatory. Participation and deliberative democracy help to build mutual trust, an important part of social capital. It naturally follows that for effective participation, the unit of decision-making must be sufficiently small. Sachs further observes that the happiest countries have small

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

43

Article | Local Government

populations. Among the top ten happiest countries, Canada is the largest with a population of 35 million. This, of course, does not necessarily mean that large countries would be necessarily unhappier. Participation can be achieved through decentralization to lower units of the government.

Nevertheless, democracy alone cannot confer happiness. World’s largest democracy, India, does not even figure among the top hundred countries in the World Happiness Index. This is because GDP/capita is an important indicator for the happiness index, in which India ranks quite low. The six indicators used for World Happiness Index are GDP/ capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity and finally trust i.e. absence of corruption. However, many other surveys on happiness do not really give a large emphasis on incomeas a factor for human happiness. Closeness to family, good health, a rewarding career and the area in which you live were considered as factors that contribute more to happiness than a lot of money.

However, a reasonable income is probably necessary to counter the worries arising from income insecurity.

Democracy and economic development

It is often argued theat democratic countries are more prosperous, which is obviously not true considering India’s case. However, the reverse seems to be true i.e. the more prosperous countries seem to gravitate towards democracy.

For this, I studied the fastest growing economies in the world. Currently, the fastest growing economies in the world are Ethiopia (+9.7%), Turkmenistan, DPR Congo, Myanmar, Uzbekistan, Cote d’Ivoire and Papua New Guinea.

Only half of these countries are democracies and some have become democracies quite recently. In fact, a few of these are guilty of several human rights abuses.

India, touted as the world’s largest democracy, registered a very mediocre rate of growth till the economic reforms from 1991 onwards led to a respectable

44 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

rate of growth of economy! China, which is hardly a democracy, has grown at a very respectable rate of growth for almost 40 years!

Thus, natural resources like oil and the right economic policies seem to influence economic rate of growth more than the form of government, democratic or otherwise!

Democracy and efficiency

Increase of efficiency in administration is rarely cited as a reason for introduction of democratic institutions.

Lord Ripon introduced local democracy as ‘an instrument of social and popular education’! In fact, he felt that efficiency may actually go down in short run when inexperienced leaders are elected to office, although it would improve in the long run. In this connection, I would define efficiency as precision, speed, unambiguity and knowledge of facts for the decision-makers. Even in the VP Naik Committee Report, the main justification for a separate post of CEO of Zilla Parishad in the local sector is that he will be able to look after the small grievances of direct importance to the people, thereby leaving the Collector free to devote his time for broader issues such as law and order, property rights and land acquisition for highways and large irrigation projects.

My experience with local government in India is that working with elected bodies gives a better direction to the efficiency of the organization in terms of right priorities. Working without an elected body can give rise to what I would call ‘targetism’. The head of the department decides some quantitative targets to be achieved and the field machinery tries to achieve the targets without assessing how much benefit these targets are giving to the common man. This striving for targets also leads to bogus reports, which were alleged for the number of completed biogas plants and for number of IUD (Intra-uterine devices, a target used for family planning) cases in Maharashtra.

Whenever it is difficult to verify the achievements, bogus reporting is resorted to highlight the efficiency of officers. A professor from the IIPA

used to say, ‘When truth is the casualty, monitoring becomes a mockery!’ I agree that even elected non-officials may not object to bogus reporting if awards are linked to these reports. However, a non-official has to get elected again and he has to focus on items which make the people in his constituency happy.

Priority for completing incomplete works, for example, is a target that comes from elected non-officials; the officers being generally happy with the quantitative utilization of the grants.

Local government in urban India

I would comment on the local government in urban India first since it has a longer history, owing its origin to Ripon Resolution of 1882. I must say that elected bodies do put the real priorities before the city in sharper focus. It is true that the administrative

After the 73rd and 74th Amendments to the Constitution of India, the State Election Commissioners, constituted under these Amendments, hold elections regularly toboth the urban and ruralbodies in India, irrespective of whether the state governments want it or not. Although devolution of subjects listed under the Constitution is discretionary, a significant devolution has been achieved

powers are with career bureaucrats, but the Budget of the City is approved by the elected body. Whether the city needs a hospital or a stadium, which roads in the city are to be taken up for repairs first and whether water supply in the tail-end of the pipeline is adequate or not is decided by the elected councillors. It is thereafter, for the career officials to take remedial action. When a city becomes very big and has more than a hundred elected councillors, it often happens that many junior and light-weight councillors cannot get time to ventilate their grievances in the Corporation meetings. It is, therefore, necessary, for senior officers to visit different Ward Committees by rotation so that maximum participation is achieved in the governance and grievances from remote areas are also known to the administration. Needless to add, adequate finances must be made available to the Ward Committees.

Local government in rural India

Decentralization to the rural selfgovernment institutions is relatively more recent.

Ancient Village Panchayats have a long history in India; however, adequate devolution of finances to them started mainly after Independence. In the Panchayati Raj structure in India today, as democratic decentralization in rural areas is called, we see two broad models for development. In Kerala and West Bengal, the Village Panchayat is itself a large enough unit, comparable in population to the area under a Primary Health Centre (PHC), ie about 30000.

In Kerala, the revenue village is itself a large unit, with each district having only about 100 villages.

Thus, an average Village Panchayat in Kerala has only 1.6 villages. In West Bengal, a village is a small unit, but each Village Panchayat has on an average 10.95 villages. Again West Bengal is densely populated like Kerala and an average Village Panchayat is spread only over about 10 to 15 sq km of area. This has allowed Kerala and West Bengal to have a Village Panchayat-

centric Panchayati Raj by allotting employees such as doctors, engineers, agriculture assistants and veterinary doctors to work with a single Village Panchayat.

The other model, which I will call the Maharashtra-Gujarat model, is the Zilla Parishad (District Council) centric model. Here the district council is strong, with all Class III and Class IV employees being employees of the Zilla Parishad. An IAS officer in senior-scale is appointed as the Chief Executive Officer of Zilla Parishad in Maharashtra. In Gujarat, he is called the District Development Officer. The VP Naik Committee on democratic decentralization recommended this model in Maharashtra and I suspect that this was inspired by the success of the Bombay Municipal Corporation, which till then had a successful history of 80 years in Maharashtra. In other words, the CEO of ZP can be considered as the counterpart of municipal commissioner for the rural areas. About two-thirds of the departments are quite similar in the Municipal Corporation and the Zilla Parishad viz general administration, education, health, public works, water supply, finance, social welfare etc. To differentiate, the Zilla Parishad has agriculture, irrigation and animal husbandry while a municipal corporation has solid waste management, sewerage, town planning and building permissions. Since a Zilla Parishad is coterminous with rural areas of a district, the CEO, ZP has to work in close coordination with the Collector in Maharashtra, although he is not his subordinate.

During his tenure as Minister for Panchayati Raj, Shri Mani Shankar Aiyer, compared the comparative devolution in different states on three ‘F’s i.e. devolution in terms of functions, functionaries and finances. On this devolution index value (2012-13), Maharashtra has achieved the highest devolution with average of the three ‘F’ indices at 62.39, followed by Karnataka 58.82 and Kerala 56.64. However, as far as the devolution to the lowest level is concerned, the Kerala model is the most noteworthy.

Epilogue

After the 73rd and 74th Amendments to the Constitution of India, the State Election Commissioners, constituted under these Amendments, hold elections regularly to both the urban and rural bodies in India, irrespective of whether the state governments want it or not. Although devolution of subjects listed under the Constitution is discretionary, a significant devolution has been achieved. Representatives elected for a period of five years and answerable to their voters are in position in both urban and rural areas making local democracy truly functional.

The CEOs of Zilla Parishads, usually appointed at about four years’ service in the IAS, are young and inexperienced officers and in Maharashtra they occasionally have conflicts with the elected representatives over transfers, recruitment and tenders. However, as MK Rustoji had observed in his study of Andhra Pradesh administration, ‘Interference in field administration is not to an extent that impedes work. It is more often used to cover up inefficiency.’

As an officer becomes senior and more experienced, he understands the democratic functioning better. Appleby observes, ‘Top level administrators closely approach the politician in ability to weigh forces, sentiments and demands. They especially understand the country; or large parts of it!’

On the whole, local democracy in India contributes to overall happiness since voters must be kept happy for the representatives to be elected again. It contributes to redressal of grievances and increases the overall welfare. It is doubtful whether it gives rise to faster economic growth rate or to more efficient and quicker administration!

(The views in this article are the author’s own and not of the Institute where he is a Visiting Professor.

Citations to quotations are not given since many are available on the Internet. The author can be contacted on jmphatak@yahoo.com)

www.urbanupdate.in | June 2017

45

URBAN AGENDA | Technology and Disaster

ULBs must integrate technology for risk reduction during disasters

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rogress in the science and technology domain relating to natural disasters has made it possible to introduce significant changes in the integrated approach to address different aspects of natural disasters. It is not just limited to accurate prediction of natural disasters, but includes study of the reasons, advancements in early warning systems and rescue mechanisms. It has transformed and strengthened the resilience of communities in handling natural and manmade disasters.

With India’s growing strength in space by the launch of many satellites, Geospatial tools are powerful keys to effective disaster response and management. Geographic Information System (GIS) techniques, Global Positioning System, Satellite Imagery and Vulnerability mapping are now facilitating disaster management.

The monitoring through production of interactive maps and geographic models with the help of these geospatial techniques makes it easier to understand and visualize the effects of the disaster which ultimately helps in deploying rescue teams effectively and to undertake post-disaster rehabilitation, recovery and reconstruction.

Who would have imagined that drones would identify hot spots in case of major fire in a city! This would not only help in accelerating rescue efforts but also ease the job of firefighters. It is a reality now.

According to a report, firefighters in South Africa are being equipped with drones with heat mapping capabilities, which would allow them to identify hot spots at the greatest risk of flare-ups – a task virtually impossible for ground crews working in blinding smoke and dense undergrowth.

JJ Rebello, Foreign Government Relations Manager at Airborne Drones South Africa, says drones will not only improve the effectiveness of firefighting efforts; they will also reduce the risk to human life during

46 June 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

firefighting operations and stand to limit damage to assets by enabling firefighters to work proactively, rather than reactively.

“Commercial drones can withstand temperature extremes from below 5 degrees Centigrade, up to 50 degrees Centigrade….

With the use of advanced thermal imaging cameras transmitting data to command centres, they can identify people or animals, even where visibility is limited by darkness, smoke or vegetation, so allowing emergency teams to pinpoint exactly where assistance is needed. Thermal imaging cameras also support proactive firefighting measures, by mapping hotspots where flare-ups could occur.”

Firefighting is not the only area which has seen significant improvement. The unique capabilities of the satellites to provide comprehensive coverage of large areas at regular intervals and with quick turnaround time have been valuable in monitoring and managing flood dynamics.

The Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC) is in talks with technology major IBM and MS Ramaiah Institute of Technology (MSRIT) to develop separate interventions that can strengthen Bengaluru VarunaMitra, the urban flood forecasting system. Such efforts can be taken by other state governments to reduce the losses due to floods.

Creating a pool of experts in the area is also important. University of Chicago has started a Masters in Disaster Management programme. As part of the disaster risk reduction programme in world cities, Rockefeller Foundation has started the 100 Resilient Cities project.

Surat was one of the cities selected under the programme. All the cities under the project appointed a Chief Resilience Officer. Urban local bodies in India and especially in disaster-prone cities must learn from the experiment and invest in risk reduction programs to make their cities resilient and safe.

Ashok Wankhade Managing Editor bhau1008@gmail.com

Technology has brought about constructive changes in the way humans live.

The advancements have also provided us with early warning systems and safeguards to reduce the impacts of natural and man-made disasters and also speed up rescue efforts

AIILSG has a footprint across the value chain in urban transformation.

Our areas of functioning involve creating and appraising DPRs, monitoring & evaluation and capacity building under Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) The institute is active in

1560

200 cities of 11 states

In 2016-17 training workshops Municipal officials/employees trained

52

All India Institute of Local Self-Government (AIILSG) whole heartedly supports Swachh Bharat Mission and is committed to play a proactive role to realise its objectives.

The institute is organising regular orientation workshops on SBM to augment the capacity of ULBs and also generating public awareness on cleanliness

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