Archives - Question of Cities

Private space and public interest in the Indian city

How we choose to imagine the city fundamentally affects whether democratic urban governance serves public interest or gets compromised by increasing privatisation. We tend to imagine it as a conceptual model translatable into technical frameworks such as a master plan.…

Gurgaon and its private
city-making model crumble. What next?

Promoted as a haven of urbanisation and India’s showcase of private entities building a city, Gurgaon turned out to be a case study of the limitations and shortcomings of this model. Barely two-three decades later, the cracks are showing. Perennial…

Mumbai’s healthcare system shows the public, not the private, matters

With its tertiary and secondary hospitals hardly functioning, the pressure falls on the large public hospitals, most of which are located in south and central Mumbai. These also see a large influx of patients from outside Mumbai. As the presence…

How healthcare privatisation undermines population health in cities

The privatisation of healthcare in low- and middle- income cities from Delhi and Mumbai to Nairobi and Lagos means shiny private clinics rise alongside crumbling public hospitals, creating a geography of care that mirrors and reinforces urban inequality. Regulatory responses…

From public good to private control: Land governance and urban exclusion in India

As India’s urban governance changed from mixed-use neighbourhoods to gated colonies, cities transformed reshaping land into a tradable asset disconnected from its social utility. Land is reserved for commercial use and high-income housing while informal neighbourhoods are missing from plans.…

Why governments promote private profiteering and undermine public goods

The increasing trend towards privatising public goods and services under the pretext of making them cost-efficient has, in fact, come at a cost to people. The difference between the cost to the government of providing a public service and the…

‘The ‘two Indias’ in healthcare – can we have a new normal?’

With the under-funded and overwhelmed public healthcare system alongside the private which over-treats in pursuit of profits, India has a peculiar combination, says renowned medical practitioner and columnist Dr Sanjay Nagral. The Ayushman Bharat insurance scheme, while beneficial for the…

Walking to un-gender and access civic commons
in Kolkata

Kolkata’s varied urban commons such as lakes, gardens, parks, ghats, streets, and rail tracks mean different things to people, especially women and queers. Walking through them is a way to reclaim the commons, initiate conversations about them, de-stigmatise them and…

The shrinking public open spaces of Mumbai

There are striking examples of vanishing commons. Open spaces such as maidans, parks, and promenades are claimed by governments for so-called public projects. Mumbai’s open space network has been disrupted prioritising engineering over ecology. Every city needs its commons. But…

Lessons for Mumbai from New York’s social housing of 1930s

Cities around the world have adopted social housing as an inalienable aspect of city-making. Understanding it as an ecology within cities will determine its design and success but it needs active government involvement to frame policies and principles. New York’s…