Archives - Question of Cities

As floods ravage cities, the game changer is to plan with nature

Every monsoon, cities across India witness flood fury. Urban flooding, which is becoming more frequent and intense every year causing devastation and disrupting lives, has spawned mitigation measures. They are essential but are they enough? As Climate Change makes its…

‘Mumbai’s development not being done as per its extreme climate risks’

India’s financial capital, Mumbai, witnessed its worst flood in July 2005. Since then, it has found a place in the list of world’s coastal cities projected to be at risk from floods, cyclones, storm surges and sea level rise due…

Gurugram: Navigating the waters between urban planning and floods

The bustling and swanky city in Haryana and part of the National Capital Region, Gurugram – earlier Gurgaon – witnessed rapid urbanisation in the past few decades but, in the process, lost a staggering 389 water bodies and many open…

Drain the rain: Why urban India floods, how to build sponge cities

Urban floods have become an inseparable part of city life every monsoon. Lives are lost, livelihoods are disrupted, and property and infrastructure worth thousands of crores are damaged or destroyed. With the increasing challenges that Climate Change has brought and…

Streets, not designated spaces, reverberate with protesters and their songs

Protests, a democratic right, need public spaces but maidans, city squares, prominent landmarks and monuments in India’s cities have been gradually cordoned off by governments that are unwilling to have such voices question the dominant narrative they set. Instead, governments…

How India’s financial capital shrunk protest sites, turned down protesters’ volume

Bombay, later Mumbai, has seen huge historical protests. Its protest sites were many – Chowpatty, Hutatma Chowk, Kala Ghoda, Gowalia Tank Maidan (now August Kranti Maidan), Jambori Maidan, Azad Maidan, Dadar station. All of them witnessed massive demonstrations and protests…

Jantar Mantar apart, Delhi’s streets and borders are now temporal protest spaces

The Boat Club was once a favoured protest space in the national capital, so were the grand avenues of Janpath and Rajpath, and the majestic India Gate. Increasingly, for reasons of security or keeping protesters away from power, protests were…

Protest sites signal democratic strength of cities

India is not new to protests and demonstrations. Its many public spaces have been platforms to question the government of the day or employers, to raise voice against abuse and exploitation, to debate and demand change. They are hubs where…

Heat index, or the temperature it feels like, will change the way India measures heat

Mere air temperature or land surface temperature, conveyed as minimum and maximum temperature twice a day, is no longer enough to combat heat during the harsh summer. The heat index, which layers temperature with other factors such as relative humidity,…

‘This summer heat is cooking our bodies alive, sweat runs off our feet’

The unbearable heat across cities this summer has been the harshest for outdoor workers who have no option but to toil through the high temperatures, without mitigating measures such as cool shelters and drinking water booths which should be provided…