Right to the City - Question of Cities

Placing platform workers in the city’s urban imagination

The city is the place of work for millions of platform or gig workers in India who number an astounding 7.7 million in official records but could well be three times that. Yet, the relationship between them and the city…

At Hyderabad airport, drivers agitate for the bare minimum

It took nearly ten years, collectivisation, and dogged unionising for the drivers of aggregator taxis at the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport to…

‘Women’s access to gig work is challenged by their access to digital infrastructure’

Women gig workers form a niche and gender-segregated part of the expanding platform and gig economy. It will reportedly provide 90 million…

Platforming domestic work will amplify existing vulnerabilities of workers

The platform and gig economy took a leap into the unorganised domestic work sector in March when advertisements promised ‘maids’ at a…

Why we must plan and build child-responsive cities in India – now

Children and urban development are rarely discussed in the same sentence. Given the definitive research on children’s physical, cognitive, and social development…

The journey from dingy to vibrant, meaningful spaces in Govandi

The cramped and ill-maintained Natwar Parekh Compound in Mumbai’s Govandi is hardly a place children can feel at home, run around, explore…

If lakes are built over, where will water go, ask Bengaluru kids

What it means to see a city through young eyes and reflect on questions that adults bypass, consciously or unconsciously, came through…

‘A happy city is where joy is not a commodity’

Rapid and unplanned urbanisation has hardly left open spaces for children. The carefree running, the cycling without the fear of speeding vehicles, the freedom that open spaces offered are now stories told by the older generations. The way cities are…

Physical space and mobility top two challenges for children in 300+ cities: LSE research

How the built environment and policy decisions of cities can support or hinder healthy early childhood development and what city officials identify…

Gender-walking through Kolkata to reimagine a better city for all

Can walking around a city as women and other genders make it accessible and safer? Can a city be ungendered and welcoming…