Federation of Karnataka Chamber or Commerce and Industry

URBANIZATION IN INDIA: MIGRATION OF A NEW KIND

Adhvith Dhuddu, Regular Columnist, JANUARY 2008 ISSUE

The turn of the century transformed Indian business, industry, government and people alike as modernization in the form of technology, internet and mobile phones seeped into the DNA of our country. While this was unfolding at a tremendous pace, it paved the way for another significant phenomenon for which we are now facing the consequences.

The mini revolution of mass migration to metropolitans and urban areas from the countryside caught many by surprise. Although a surge of people into cities was expected, the pace and magnitude is what created imbalances and debunked the inadequacies of large metros. The tech boom is what sparked this mass relocation, but now something else even more monumental might tip the balance to create mass hysteria in the metros.

This new episode, for which the seeds have already been sown, is the further migration from the rural areas to cities driven by the increase in productivity in agriculture and improved farming techniques. In India, 13.5 million hectares of arable agricultural land is cultivated by approximately 14 million farming families. As more efficient farming techniques emerge, as technology is introduced into farming, as private players and investors foray into agriculture, as supply chains become shorter and more efficient (elimination of APMCs, middlemen), as biotechnology and biochemistry percolate into our farms, as more efficient irrigation methods are adopted and as land tilled per farmer increases, the overall productivity of farmers will rise considerably.

As farming families become more productive, more members will have less to do and look to non-agricultural sources of income. This will attract them to teir one and teir two cities as rural areas lack diversity in income and business. Often, this is their only window of hope in their pursuit to increase non-agricultural income. A flow of this kind could be more devastating to cities (compared to the IT-migration) if proper planning and forecasting is not done. We must learn from the tech era that people do migrate to elevate their standard of living and quality of life. Then, we were drastically underprepared, under planned and only a crisis prompted action in many cases, but now we can plan, prepare and build for the future and avoid an unnecessary strain on capacities.

This differs from the IT-migration era because of the potential strain it can exert on the system. The agri-migration era will be slow and long (20-30 years) and this can either be a boon or a bane depending upon how well we recognize and confront this issue. Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai and New Delhi (Guragaon) are ideal examples of this phenomenon. Civilizations tend to live and thrive in urbanized environments rather than rural ones.

Many solutions and reforms have been suggested for improving infrastructure, roads, etc. But this massive shift of population calls for basic structural reform and the respective governing bodies should be well equipped to assess, analyze and act. This macro issue calls for a multi-pronged solutions with multi-year reforms.

Union Minister of Panchayati Raj, Mr. Mani Shankar Aiyar, in the recent Economic Summit for Rural and Urban Development, suggested that one cure could be to initiate urbanization of rural India. But this, he said, starts with providing basic amenities like clean drinking water, proper sanitation, uninterrupted electricity, etc (often these are the reasons people migrate to cities). More importantly, he stressed on increasing sources of non-agricultural income and non-agricultural businesses in rural areas to stifle the future surge of people to cities. There was clearly a sense of urgency detected to remove the roadblocks for the development of rural India.

Empowerment at the local levels is a must (LSGs, district and city officials) and the mulishness of trying to centrally plan rural development for the entire country should be eliminated. This whole process should be participatory oriented and not bureaucracy oriented. Improving roads in villages is a crucial factor to increase rural affluence. This should be top priority for officials because this particular change can help villages in ways others cannot: it gives access to better education and schools, it gives access to better health care and hospitals, it inflates the size of rural markets giving rise to micro-businesses and will significantly increase nonfarm rural employment.

Individuals no doubt feel enriched by moving to a city, and in a democratic India where there are no restrictions on migration (unlike China, where there is a cap on migration to cities) and mobility is cheap and easy, metros will continue to inflate. So even with the control mechanisms in place, migration could slow down but will definitely not stop. Urban India is certainly poised to take on the world, but let us allow rural India and the, ‘aam admi,’ to enter the 21^st century with hope, optimism and confidence.

Online link to this article: FKCCI JANUARY 2008 ISSUE