Author: cpradmin

The launch of the Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM) in 2014 brought in significant policy attention on universalising basic sanitation in India. The programme set out to achieve Open Defecation Free (ODF) status by October 2019, however also helped make all tiers and agencies of the state focus on all aspects of sanitation. Around the same time, Odisha which had been lagging on sanitation services also witnessed an increase in policy attention towards achieving safely managed sanitation for all driven from a number of internal factors. Based on early research on alternative sanitation service delivery models since 2013, in 2015, Centre for Policy Research (CPR) and Practical Action with the support from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and Arghyam initiated Project Nirmal in partnership with Odisha’s Housing and Urban Development Department (H&UDD), District Administration, and Municipal governments initiated a pilot demonstration for instituting Faecal Sludge Management (FSM) systems and strengthening decentralised sanitation service delivery in two medium towns of Odisha – Dhenkanal and Angul. Project Nirmal was conceptualised in response to an increased thrust towards, and need for, FSM in the state. It was envisaged that the learnings from Project Nirmal’s implementation would inform state- and national-level legal, financial, institutional, and community participation frameworks for scaling up the project approach. In 2018, under Project Nirmal, Dhenkanal emerged as one of the first municipalities in Odisha to construct a Faecal Sludge Treatment Plant (FSTP) with support from AMRUT. Consequently, Odisha rapidly embarked on a journey to achieve SDG 6 (clean water and sanitation for all) in its urban areas by covering all urban local bodies under FSM. By 2022, all but two of the 115 cities and towns in the state had already built and started operating safe citywide FSM systems.

As rural India also embarked on a journey towards eliminating Open Defecation under SBM-G, rural areas in Odisha witnessed rapid construction of toilet facilities marked by a predominance of on-site sanitation systems. Our research and surveys showed that a bulk of these toilets had been constructed with single pits or septic tanks and not twin pits as recommended by the programme. Consequently, the emerging need for FSM in rural areas was identified. To address this issue and building on Odisha’s success with instituting FSM systems in its urban areas, CPR and UNICEF with support from the District Government of Dhenkanal, Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) and Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) piloted a novel “urban-rural convergence” in Dhenkanal district by taking a district-wide planning approach. This novel “urban-rural convergence” approach aims to leverage the existing FSM treatment infrastructure and desludging services in urban areas to provide FSM service in neighbouring rural areas. The urban-rural convergence approach, therefore, bridges the urban-rural divide, bypasses the need for creating additional infrastructure, and provides opportunities for institutional convergence. Moreover, by virtue of providing FSM services in rural areas, this approach has consequential positive impact on local environmental pollution abatement and minimising health risks associated with unsafe management of faecal waste. Therefore, to apply theory to practice, the Dhenkanal pilot demonstration was conceptualised and executed to demonstrate the workings of this approach by extending existing FSM services in Dhenkanal Municipality to neighbouring Gram Panchayats (GPs).
Under the Dhenkanal urban-rural convergence pilot demonstration, a “Plug-in Model” for tagging rural GPs with Dhenkanal Municipality was built by using a step-by-step planning approach wherein:

1. spatial analysis was conducted to identify ‘plug-in zones’ (within a 10-20 km radius from urban areas);
2. sample survey was conducted to estimate the rural faecal sludge loading;
3. capacity utilization trend for Dhenkanal FSTP was analysed to estimate spare capacity; and
4. stakeholder consultations were organised to build consensus amongst and urban and rural local bodies.

Afterwards, a Memorandum of Agreement was signed between Dhenkanal Municipality and tagged rural GPs to codify the terms of agreements such as tariff structure for desludging services, mechanisms for payment, and financing and monitoring. Additionally, Information Education and Communication (IEC) campaigns were launched in the tagged rural GPs to spread awareness and generate demand for FSM services.

Figure 1: Memorandum of Agreement signing between urban and rural functionaries

The urban-rural convergence pilot in Dhenkanal successfully extended FSM services to 110 plugged-in rural GPs, benefitting over 2 lakh rural households. As of October 2022, Dhenkanal Municipality’s FSTP has received and treated over 1000 KL of rural sludge received from the plugged-in rural GPs.

 Figure 2: Desludging vehicles emptying faecal sludge and septage at treatment plant

 Figure 3: Faecal Sludge Treatment Plant in Dhenkanal Municipality

After the successful pilot demonstration in Dhenkanal, a similar pilot was also implemented in the Angul district of Odisha where 77 rural GPs were tagged to Angul Municipality, benefitting over 90,000 rural households. Moreover, based on the learnings from the pilot demonstration for urban-rural convergence using the district-wide planning approach, we have developed a “Template for District-level Faecal Sludge Management (FSM) Planning” that aims to aid state and district governments, practitioners, and developmental partners in creating a District-level FSM Plan for any district in the country. The Template is founded on two approaches to enabling FSM services for rural households, viz. plug-in and greenfield (stand-alone FSM infrastructure and services in rural GPs), aligned with the guidance from the SBM-G Phase II.
The urban-rural convergence model has received significant traction in the state and national policy circles owing to the uniqueness and replicability of this approach. The Government of India releasing a notification on 14th September, 2021 urging the state governments across India to facilitate the adoption of an integrated approach by urban and rural authorities for convergent action on FSM and Plastic Waste Management (PWM). Moreover, due to the success of the pilot demonstrations in Dhenkanal and Angul districts and recognition by the State and National Ministries, the Government of Odisha decided to scale up the urban-rural convergence model for FSM and PWM to all the districts in the state, supported by Centre for Policy Research. Consequently, a Letter of Understanding (LoU) was signed on 21 September 2021 between the Housing and Urban Development Department, Government of Odisha, Panchayati Raj and Drinking Water Department, Government of Odisha, and CPR and UNICEF for scaling up the model in a phase-wise manner.

 Figure 4: Signing of Letter of Understanding Event

Recognising the uniqueness and potential for replication of the urban-rural convergence model, Dhenkanal Municipality was felicitated with the ISC-FICCI Sanitation Award for the “Best Faecal Sludge and Septage Management Model” in 2021. In 2022, Centre for Policy Research won the ISC-FICCI Sanitation Awards 2022 for Best Non-Profit Engagement Model in Sanitation: Urban for spearheading the pilot implementation of the urban-rural convergence model in Dhenkanal.

 Figure 5: ISC-FICCI Sanitation Award 2022 ceremony

Sabina Dewan is a Senior Visiting Fellow at CPR and Founder and Executive Director of the JustJobs Network. Her research focusses on delineating strategies for job creation and workforce development. She works closely with governments, businesses, multilateral and grassroots organisations providing critical labour market information to improve interventions aimed at generating more and better employment, and cultivating employability, especially for women, youth and marginalised groups. In this edition of CPR Faculty Speak, she talks about her work and interests at CPR, why they matter, what impact she hopes to achieve and more.

Tell us about your research work and interests at CPR.

“To find out what one is fitted to do, and to secure an opportunity to do it, is the key to happiness.” With this quote, American philosopher and educational reformer, John Dewey captures the centrality of purposeful work to our lives. My life’s work is understanding labour markets. This includes examining the impact of major forces like technology, climate change, and the pandemic, on employment in India. At CPR, I focus on unfolding trends; for instance, how the proliferation of digital labour platforms affects women’s work; or how the pandemic affected small businesses and their workers. The goal is to ultimately suggest ways to manage the impact of these forces and to create better work, more resilient workforces, and an inclusive labour market.

Why do these issues interest you?

I believe that a healthy labour market is the foundation for everything from the well-being and development of society, to political and economic performance. Given the scale and heterogeneity of India’s labour market, the challenges we face are enormous. India has the largest youth population in the world. Over 90 percent of our employment is informal; and close to 70 percent of our businesses are unregistered. Our female labour force participation is among the bottom third relative to other countries. We must prioritize the provision of enough good quality employment for our large and growing youth population; improve women’s economic participation; and enable wider access to entitlements. My work is focussed on cultivating a deep understanding of these issues from the ground up, and to help find solutions to a range of employment challenges. We must lift these issues up as priorities in public discourse and policymaking.

How has this issue evolved in the country and globally over the years?

Over the last decade, the world has moved from a discourse centred on the impact of economic integration and globalization on labour, to a focus on how major forces such as climate change, technological acceleration, demographic transitions, and more recently the pandemic, are restructuring labour markets and upending traditional employment models. These changes are happening at a pace and scale that is faster than the ability of governance institutions — labour regulation, social protection, education and skills training systems, to keep up. India is also grappling with these challenges.

What impact do you aim to achieve through your research?

My work tries to understand the impact of these forces on the world of work and suggest ways to (re)design relevant governance architecture such as the labour codes and associated rules; social security provision; education and skills training systems; incentive and support for small businesses, to help build more resilient labour markets. My goal is to help move beyond reactionary policy and action to prompt a more strategic approaches to good job creation and workforce development.

What are you currently working on and why is it important?

The last two decades have seen a proliferation of digital platforms and the emergence of an ecosystem of digital work. One of my current projects looks at how work mediated through digital platforms is gendered; how it affects outcomes for women; and how it does, or does not, shift power relations for women in the economy, society, and in their own households. The many benefits of women’s economic participation are well known, and yet their participation rate in India remains low relative to other countries and relative to Indian men. We need to understand why this continues to be the case, and the opportunities and challenges emerging trends in the labour market pose for women’s work.

I am simultaneously working on a study that assesses the impact of COVID-19 on Indian small businesses and their workers. 63.4 million non-agricultural micro, small and medium enterprises employ just under 111 million workers and contribute to approximately 30 percent of Gross Domestic Product. Given these facts, understanding what factors helped some businesses survive the crisis while others failed, and the experiences of the workers in these businesses, is critical to securing businesses and workers against future shocks.

To know more about Sabina Dewan’s work, click here.

New Delhi 7 December: The Scaling City Institutions for India (SCI-FI) Initiative at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) won the award for the ‘best non-profit engagement model in sanitation: rural and urban’ at the 6th edition of the ISC-FICCI Sanitation Awards Ceremony and India Sanitation Conclave. CPR’s SCI-FI Initiative was presented the award in recognition and appreciation for the unique urban-rural convergence model for faecal sludge management in Dhenkanal in Odisha. The initiative has been working in the state since 2014, offering technical expertise to the state and local-level administration to achieve safely-managed sanitation for all.

The urban-rural convergence project was conceptualised by CPR’s SCI-FI Initiative in response to the emerging need for faecal sludge management in Odisha’s rural areas as the state witnessed rapid construction of toilet facilities under Swachh Bharat. The model is based on taking a district-wide planning approach to sanitation. It involves leveraging existing urban sanitation infrastructure and services for rural areas, in neighboring gram panchayats. The successful implementation of the model has led to a scale-up across Odisha. It has also received traction at the national level.

Speaking on the occasion, Shubhagato Dasgupta, Senior Fellow and Director of CPR’s SCI-FI Initiative said, “We are delighted to receive this award and would like to thank our many partners including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, UNICEF, Arghyam, Practical Action, the Municipality and District government of Dhenkanal and finally and foremost the Housing and Urban Development Department of the Government of Odisha without whom this would not have been possible.”

President and Chief Executive of CPR, Yamini Aiyar said, “In the past few years, CPR has broadened its engagements and deepened work at the subnational level, offering technical expertise to solve difficult and complex policy problems. Our longstanding work in Odisha aimed to provide safely managed sanitation for all is one such example. This award is a recognition of that effort.”

For media queries and more information, please contact:
Hemali Sodhi: hemali@cprindia.org
Dhruv Bhasin: dhruv.bhasin@cprindia.org
Anju Dwivedi: anju.dwivedi@cprindia.org

Land Rights Initiative turns 8 today! As we mark this important milestone, I am incredibly grateful to the Centre for Policy Research, our researchers, donors, mentors, collaborators, government, civil society groups, and communities that have made this journey possible and our work sustainable.

I set up the Land Rights Initiative (“LRI”) with the belief that land is central not just to India’s economic development agenda but to the very idea of India itself. Even as we celebrate 75 years of India’s independence this year, almost 60 percent of all Indians are directly dependent upon the land for their livelihoods. Land is not just an economic resource; it is also central to individual dignity and community identity, history, and culture. Land reforms were crucial not only to India’s economic development but also to its political independence and social redistribution story.

India’s freedom movement was premised upon liberating us from a past of colonial domination and subordination and upon building a future that would bring about rapid economic development for all Indians and ensure individual dignity for all. The Indian Constitution adopted in 1950 safeguarded land rights of Scheduled Tribes and through the inclusion of the fundamental right to property in Article 19(1) (f), for the first time guaranteed equal property rights to all Indians, including women and Dalits or Scheduled Castes. Together, women, Scheduled Castes, and Adivasis or Scheduled Tribes constitute the bottom 60% of the population.

However, as the development agenda played out over the following decades, it brought to the fore the inherent tension between the utilitarian nature of the “development discourse” and the dignitarian nature of the “rights discourse”. This led to the gradual demise of the right to property through a series of constitutional amendments between 1951 and 1978. Ostensibly done for the benefit of the poor, the period since the abolition of the right to property in fact saw greater displacement and dispossession of people from the land due to various development projects. Particularly vulnerable were the Scheduled Tribes, which constitute only 8.6% of India’s population but constitute nearly 50% of those displaced between 1950 and 1999, many of them twice in one lifetime due to dams, mines, wildlife parks, and sanctuaries. This widespread development-induced displacement led to persistent and ubiquitous legal and extra-legal conflict over land, plaguing the lives of people across millions of hectares of land and threatening investments worth billions of dollars.

It was against this backdrop that Land Rights Initiative set out to investigate the reasons for conflict over land and to build a body of knowledge that would enable the government to formulate and implement policies in a way that would preserve the land rights of the people of India without derailing the development agenda.

Over the first five years of its existence, LRI released two pioneering research reports and a singular policy brief that outlined reasons for land conflict and made policy suggestions for reform. The first research report on Land Acquisition in India: A Review of Supreme Court Cases from 1950 to 2016 (CPR: 2017) constituted a first-time-ever comprehensive attempt to analyse all judicial decisions by the Supreme Court on land acquisition, numbering 1269, to illuminate the reasons for popular discontent with the government’s processes of land acquisition which had, in turn, led to both legal and extra-legal conflict over land. This Report has been used extensively by the Department of Land Resources in the Ministry of Rural Development and has been used in training and capacity-building programmes by the National Highways Authority of India and the National Institute for Defence Estates Management. The Report has also been used widely by individual litigants defending their lands against governmental acquisition. That this Report is now the authoritative text on land acquisition is evident from the fact that it was cited by opposing parties, both the government and farmers, before the Supreme Court Constitution bench in Indore Development Authority v. Manoharlal and others (2020).

The second research report on The Legal Regime and Political Economy of Land Rights of Scheduled Tribes in Scheduled Areas of India (CPR:2018) for the first time mapped the Scheduled Areas and plotted the forest cover and mines in India to show a significant overlap with the Scheduled Areas. Through a review of the constitutional and legal provisions pertaining to the Scheduled Areas, and conflicting narratives of identity and development of Scheduled Tribes, the Report was able to shed light on the reasons for the displacement, poverty, and landlessness of Scheduled Tribes. Recommendations from this Report and the National Seminar on Understanding Landlessness and Displacement of, and Atrocities against Scheduled Tribes co-organised by LRI and the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST) in 2018, and the 2020 NCST report on Tribal Land Alienation in India, for which I served as an expert advisor, were incorporated into NCST’s Annual report (2019-2020) under Article 338A of the Constitution. NCST’s Annual Report was sent to the President of India in early 2021.

Consolidating our work over a five-year period, the policy brief on Understanding Land Conflict in India: Suggestions for Reform (2019) highlighted the conflicting people versus state narratives over land which in turn had led to over a thousand colonial and post-colonial laws and administrative practices. The absence of a publicly available comprehensive database of land laws greatly hampered citizen access to the laws that govern one of the most important aspects of our lives. The desire to fill this gap is what birthed LRI’s most ambitious project called One Thousand Land Laws: Mapping Indian Land Laws. Conceptualised and executed over a period of five years, this project involves an attempt to create a comprehensive, exploratory archive of all land laws in India, a veritable “google maps for land laws”. This year, we launched the web and mobile versions of this website, accessible at landlawsofindia.org.

The website currently features officially authenticated copies of nearly 500 original and active central laws, and state laws from a geographically representative sample of eight states, namely, Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Meghalaya, Punjab, and Telangana. The website also features Hindi and English language summaries of all laws. From laws pertaining to land reforms and land acquisition, to revenue and taxation and land use, forest and mining laws; from laws promoting and regulating urban and infrastructural development to laws dealing with evacuee, enemy, ancestral and religious property, this vast legal apparatus governs the lives of the people of India, and their interactions with each other and the state. Embedded within the website is a subject-wise classification of all the laws according to over thirty categories, further subdivided into a hundred and fifty sub categories.

For our work in creating citizen awareness and deepening democracy, in 2020, LRI was one of fifteen organisations (out of a hundred and fifty) shortlisted for the inaugural Shamnad Basheer Citizenship Prize, which recognises organisations transforming the field of law and justice. LRI’s research papers have informed courses and curricula across law schools and social science programmes. LRI’s internship programme has exposed and nurtured an entire generation of students in research on this complex subject. As the pioneering institution in the land policy space, LRI has also nurtured the land policy ecosystem by supporting the work of land policy initiatives at other research institutions.

Even as LRI enters its ninth year, climate devastation is upon us and world leaders are meeting in Egypt at the UN Climate Change Conference 27 to shape our collective response to the climate crisis. Our learnings over the past eight years have led us to conclude that land is not just crucial to the imagination of India, but also crucial to our imagination of sustainable survival on planet earth. We at LRI strongly believe that the indigenous imagination of “jal, jungle, zameen” as constituting an indivisible ecosystem, is crucial not just to the preservation of the way of life of Adivasis or Scheduled Tribes but is crucial to sustainable living on the planet. Land rights are an important mechanism for ensuring individual dignity and intergenerational equity, and community-based resource management systems are important for sustainable development. Over the next two years, LRI hopes to create dialogic engagement between our body of work on land rights and economic development with climate imaginaries of sustainable survival.

Dr. Namita Wahi
Founding Director, Land Rights Initiative
Senior Fellow, Centre for Policy Research

The Initiative on Climate, Energy and Environment (ICEE) at the Centre for Policy Research organised a seminar series from 2017 to 2018 entitled ‘Clearing the Air?’. Featuring the voices of prominent researchers, doctors, civil society members, and experts, this series of 10 events aimed to promote sustained and informed public discourse on the data, impacts, sources and policy challenges involved in addressing India’s air pollution crisis.

Filling the Knowledge Gap on Air Quality in Indian Cities
Date: December 4, 2017
Speaker: Dr. Sarath Guttikunda – Founder and Director, UrbanEmissions.Info, NASA Earth and Space Science Fellow, and TED Fellow
About the Seminar: Dr. Guttikunda discussed the contribution of various sources to air pollution in Delhi, identified gaps in knowledge and data availability on air pollution in India, and explained the challenges of monitoring emissions across different sources.

Selected excerpts from this discussion are available in the form of a written Q&A.

To learn more, watch the full video of Dr. Guttikunda’s presentation, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

Health Effects of Exposure to Air Pollution (co-organised with Public Health Foundation of India)
Date: December 20, 2017
Speakers:
Dr. Prabhakaran – Vice President (Research & Policy), Public Health Foundation of India
Dr. Preet Dhillon – Epidemiologist, Sr. Scientific Officer, Public Health Foundation of India
Moderated by Bhargav Krishna – Manager, Centre for Environmental Health, Public Health Foundation of India

About the Seminar: This panel of clinicians, health experts and researchers from the Public Health Foundation of India discussed the effects of air pollution on important health outcomes such as cardiovascular diseases, respiratory diseases and cancer.

To learn more, watch the full video of the speakers’ presentations, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

Air Pollution as a Preventable Cause of Adverse Birth Outcomes in India: New Evidence from Cohort Studies in Tamil Nadu
Date: January 10, 2018
Speaker: Kalpana Balakrishnan Ph.D., FAMS – Director, World Health Organization Collaborating Center for Occupational and Environmental Health, SRU-ICMR Centre for Advanced Research on Air Quality, Climate and Health, Department of Environmental Health Engineering, Sri Ramachandra University, Chennai

About the Seminar: Dr. Balakrishnan presents results from a recently concluded cohort study in Tamil Nadu that provides some of the first quantitative effects estimates for linking rural-urban PM2.5 exposures and birthweight in India, adding important evidence from high exposure settings that experience dual health burdens from ambient and household air pollution. Highlighting the need to consider maternal exposures to PM2.5, Dr. Balakrishnan emphasises the imminent need for strategic air quality actions focused on protecting vulnerable groups such as pregnant women and infants.

To learn more, watch the full video of Dr. Balakrishnan’s presentation, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

Role of the Transport Sector in Delhi’s Air Quality: Key Drivers and Opportunities for Intervention
Date: February 1, 2018
Speakers:
Amit Bhatt – Director of Integrated Urban Transport, WRI-India
Parthaa Bosu – Lead Consultant, Environment Defence Fund
Sumit Sharma – Fellow and Associate Director, Earth Science and Climate Change, TERI
Moderated by Mukta Naik – Senior Researcher, CPR

About the Seminar: Vehicular pollution has been a significant contributor to air pollution in India. This panel deliberated on key technical and policy drivers for the reduction and management of emissions from the transport sector, including the source composition of air pollution from transport, potential gains from changes in fuel standards and fuel types, and issues related to public transport and modal shares.

Selected excerpts from this discussion are available in the form of a written Q&A.

To learn more, watch the full video of the speakers’ presentations, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

Crop Burning as a Source of Air Pollution in the National Capital Region
Date: February 23, 2018
Speakers:
Dr. HS Sidhu – Senior Research Engineer, Borlaug Institute of South Asia
Pritam Singh Hanjra – Farmer from village Urlana Khurd, Panipat, Haryana
Dr. Rajbir Yadav – Principal Scientist, Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI)
Moderated by Harish Damodaran – Rural Affairs and Agriculture Editor, The Indian Express

About the Seminar: This discussion on crop residue burning as a source of air pollution explored the genesis of the problem, and touched upon some recent technological interventions intended to address the issue. It also discussed some of the key political, scientific, economic and social drivers that need to be considered while designing a long-term solution to crop residue burning. Selected excerpts from this discussion are available in the form of a written Q&A.

To learn more, watch the full video of the speakers’ presentations, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

Municipal Solid Waste as a Cause of Air Pollution
Date: March 7, 2018
Speakers:
Ravi Agarwal – Founder & Director of Toxics Link
Nalini Shekhar – Co-founder of Hasiru Dala
Dr. Seema Awasthi – Founder & Director of ICUC Consultants Pvt. Ltd
Moderated by Arkaja Singh – Fellow, Centre for Policy Research

About the Seminar: Solid waste burning is being recognised as a significant contributor to the deteriorating air quality in the NCR. This panel discussed some of the best practices on waste disposal that can help reduce exposure to airborne toxins from municipal solid waste. Some of the strategies suggested gave primacy to waste workers, whereas others emphasised technology, infrastructure and management. Selected excerpts from this discussion are available in the form of a written Q&A.

To learn more, watch the full video of the speakers’ presentations, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

Campaigning for Air Quality: Lessons from Two Decades of Advocacy
Date: April 12, 2018
Speakers:
Anumita Roychowdhury – Executive Director, Research & Advocacy, Centre for Science and Environment
In conversation with Navroz K Dubash – Senior Fellow, Centre for Policy Research

About the Seminar: Anumita Roychowdhury has been at the forefront of the clean air campaign in India for more than two decades. In this conversation, she discussed effective strategies to improve air quality regulation and governance, and reflected on some of the lessons learnt from shaping policy through deep government engagement and work with the courts. She also discussed the importance of strong institutions, evidence-based policy, and effective long-term implementation strategies to deal with poor air quality. Selected excerpts from this discussion are available in the form of a written Q&A.

To learn more, watch the full video of the conversation, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

Power Plants as a Source of Air Pollution in India
Date: May 11, 2018
Speakers:
Vinuta Gopal – Co-founder & Director, Asar Social Impact Advisors
Priyavrat Bhati – Programme Director, Energy, Centre for Science & Environment
Ritwick Dutta – Environmental Lawyer & Founder, Legal Initiative of Forest & Environment
Moderated by Shibani Ghosh – Fellow, Centre for Policy Research

About the Seminar: Sulphates, nitrates, mercury and particulate matter emitted from power plants contribute significantly to air pollution in the country. The panel discussed the scale of the problem, described the governing regulatory eco-system, and analysed the policy formulation process for the 2015 emission norms, explaining why there was limited compliance. The speakers also deliberated on the role of the courts – the National Green Tribunal and the Supreme Court – in regulating pollution from power plants. Selected excerpts from this discussion are available in the form of a written Q&A.

To learn more, watch the full video of the speakers’ presentations, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

Thick with Dust: Air Pollution in the National Capital Region
Date: July 16, 2018
Speakers:
Dr. Umesh Chandra Kulshrestha – Professor, JNU, New Delhi
Dr. Anuradha Shukla – Chief Scientist, Central Road Research Institute
Mr. Sunil Agarwal – Founder and Managing Director, Black Olive Ventures
Moderated by Navroz K Dubash – Senior Fellow, Centre for Policy Research

About the Seminar: While dust is often seen as nothing more than an irritant, suspended particulate matter and other dust pollutants present very real threats to air quality, and create toxic respiratory conditions, particularly for vulnerable sections of the population like outdoor workers, children, and the elderly. This panel explored the environmental and health-related consequences of dust in the air, including the nature and scale of the dust problem, how climatic factors and increasing desertification contribute to the problem, and what changes need to be made to the regulatory environment.

To learn more, watch the full video of the panel discussion here.

Lessons from the Ground: Civic Engagement with Air Pollution
Date: August 8, 2018
Speakers:
Dr. Rohit Negi – Associate Professor, Ambedkar University, Delhi
Ashutosh Dikshit – CEO, United Residents Joint Action, Delhi
Chetan Bhattacharji – Managing Editor, NDTV
Moderated by Dr. Navroz K. Dubash – Senior Fellow, Centre for Policy Research

About the Seminar: This panel analysed whether and how civil society has been able to constructively contribute to the public discourse on air pollution. It also explored ways in which it has been able to – or can potentially in future – influence policy change and ensure effective and sustained action on air quality regulation and governance.

To learn more, watch the full video of the speakers’ presentations, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience.

India’s Smart Cities Mission (SCM) was launched by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs in 2015 to improve infrastructure, enhance service delivery, increase citizen engagement, and meet sustainability and inclusivity goals through institutional and technological innovations. Over the last seven years, the SCM has been gradually implemented in 100 cities, with varied experiences and trajectories. The core SCM policy has also substantially evolved in its push for cities to ensure digitalization of municipal services and infrastructures and collecting large urban data (Parkar and Purandare, Forthcoming). Alongside city-level implementations and policy, literature on the SCM have also been diverse and evolving.

Early work unravelled the multiple interpretations of smartness in policy (Khan et al. 2018; Praharaj and Han 2019), highlighted institutional restructuring and rescaling through the Special Purpose Vehicles (Taraporevala 2018), suggested postcolonial imagination of ‘speed’ or ‘fast urbanism’ through a digital turn (Datta 2018), or as technological fixes (Khan et al. 2018). More recent work has tried to evaluate various trajectories of city-level implementations (Prasad et al. 2021), particular SCM infrastructures such as Integrated Command and Control Centres (ICCC) (Praharaj 2020), or smart city responses to the pandemic (Datta et al. 2021) and suggested that the SCM drives fragmented placemaking projects (Prasad et al. 2022). Other literature has tried to unravel various actors such as consultants that are involved in the SCM from contributing to national policy to the ideation and implementation of city-level projects (Purandare 2021).

As the SCM approaches its end date in June 2023 and cities rush to finish projects, this workshop seeks to bring together varied strands of research that try to take stock of the mission. We invite papers that are interested in looking at the multiple facets of the SCM such as policy and legislation, governance institutions and their relations, networks of actors and agencies, implications of technologies and infrastructures implemented in various cities. We seek to organize papers through the following axes:

I. Governing Smart Cities: Actors, Institutions and Relationships of Power

The Smart City Mission introduced mandatory institutional conditions to plan and monitor projects. The creation of Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) and the recourse to Project Management Consultants (PMCs) are instrumental in reshaping the boundaries between the public and the private sector, modifying the balance between scales of government, and in disrupting existing power relationships between and within the bureaucratic, political, and civil society realms. Adding on, the growth of digital solutions is likely to cause long-lasting impacts on organisational cultures and professional practices, leading to transformations in decision-making processes. Considering these factors, we seek papers that critically look at governance shifts at work under the SCM.

• How do we understand the SCM impacts on the relationships between different scales of government and on the capacities of existing municipal agencies?
• How do the networks of private actors such as PMCs, system integrators, and vendors shape implementations of the smart city?
• What is the role of civil society and political actors in Smart City governance?
• How do service and data centralization exercises through the ICCC shape convergences between multiple city agencies? Does the SCM tackle the problem of departmental silos, or does it enhance it further?
• How can we locate the SPV between conventional governance agencies? What are possible futures of the SPV in municipal governance? What have been the impacts of SPV on procurement, financial practices and asset management?

II. Infrastructures and the Production of Cities

Cities under the SCM have substantially spent funds on redevelopment, retrofitting, and improving urban infrastructure. At the same time, cities have also invested in digital infrastructure such as CCTV cameras, optical fibre cables, sensors, and data centres. The SCM also gave rise to a new hybrid form of infrastructure which combined classical urban infrastructure with digital components through projects such as smart poles and smart roads. Further, the projects under the SCM involve creation of multiple apps and platforms that deliver or manage municipal services through automation and analytics. In this context, we seek papers that engage with infrastructures created under the SCM.

• How does the SCM perform in infrastructure delivery in comparison to previous and contemporary urban development programs?
• How do we conceptualise newer forms of urban infrastructures created under the SCM?
  What is the future of the SCM digital infrastructures within conventional municipal governance or under new forms of governance such as SPVs?
• What are various spatial effects of infrastructuring and placemaking exercises under the SCM on city planning and allied practices?

III. Sustainability and Inclusivity in Smart Cities

One of the stated objectives of the SCM is to focus on sustainable and inclusive development by placing communities at the core of planning and implementation. It attempts to bring integrated and sustainable solutions through innovative methods and careful selection of technologies. Many cities under the SCM have proposals for the development of green and open spaces (Mundoli et al., 2017). Amidst recurring environmental catastrophes such as heatwaves, pollution crisis, and urban flooding, cities have also devised disaster management plans (Prasad and Alizadeh, 2020). There is focus on solar powered energy and emphasis towards a switch to LED light bulbs from incandescent, halogen and compact fluorescent lighting systems. There are also projects that promote active transport, dedicated bike lanes, and non-motorised and electric vehicles. In this background, we call for papers that focus on environmental aspects of the projects under the SCM.

• What solutions do Smart Cities offer to global environmental challenges? How effective are these solutions?
• How do the projects under the SCM address ecological and social concerns faced by the cities? What are the outcomes of such projects?
• How do Smart Cities contribute towards reduction of carbon emissions and attaining sustainable development goals?
• How is the technology leveraged to offer sustainable solutions? How do these solutions impact the people living in cities?

IV. Digital Democracy Futures

The SCM asks cities to engage with citizens in creating their proposals and implementing solutions that enhance participation. Notwithstanding questions of digital literacy, policy vocabulary suggests using digital tools to ensure transparency, bring about accountability and engage with communities, organisations, and academic networks. In light of this, cities deploy various digital solutions ranging from app-based taxation and licensing, online grievance redressal portals, to kiosks for accessing municipal services. At the same time, cities also make use of multiple surveillance systems such as CCTV networks and collect vast urban data through these infrastructures and platforms. With this understanding, we invite papers that address questions of democracy in the context of digitalization.

• How have cities engaged with citizens in planning and implementing the SCM? What are the experiences in engaging with citizens groups, communities, and civil society?
• In what ways digital interventions impact transparency and accountability in governance practices?
• How has digitalization contributed to participatory processes of urban governance? What are its implications towards conventional offline access to elected representatives?
• How does data collection and algorithmic automation shape citizen experiences? What are the impacts of surveillance systems created in the SCM?
• What are the implications of datafication practices in the context of limited privacy laws and protections?

Workshop Details

The workshop will be conducted in a hybrid mode, but with a preference that participants are able to travel to Delhi to present their work in person. Partial funding may be available for participants who require travel support. We expect the papers presented in the workshop to lead to an edited volume.
If you are interested in participating in the workshop, please send your abstracts of between 250-300 words to smartcities@cprindia.org by 14 October 2022. Please indicate your full name, current affiliation, and whether you will prefer to participate online or in person. If you would require funding to travel to Delhi, please indicate that as well.

Timeline:

Deadline for submissions of abstracts: 14 October 2022
Selection of abstracts: 21 October 2022
Full papers due: 18 December 2022
Workshop: 17 & 18 January 2023

Convenors:

Gaurav Mittal (Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi)
Khaliq Parkar (CESSMA, IRD, Universite Paris Cite, Paris)
Marie-Helene Zerah (CESSMA, IRD, Universite Paris Cite, Paris)

References:

Datta, Ayona. 2018. “Postcolonial Urban Futures: Imagining and Governing India’s Smart Urban Age.” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 37(3): 393–410.
———. 2021. “Apps, Maps and War Rooms: On the Modes of Existence of ‘COVtech’ in India.” Urban Geography 42(3): 382–90.
Khan, Sama, Persis Taraporevala, and Marie-Helene Zerah. 2018. “Mission Impossible Defining Indian Smart Cities.” Economic & Political Weekly 53(49): 80–88.
Mundoli, Seema, Hita Unnikrishnan, and Harini Nagendra. 2017. “The ‘Sustainable’ in Smart Cities: Ignoring the Importance of Urban Ecosystems.” Decision 44(2): 103–20.
Parkar, Khaliq, and Uttara Purandare. Forthcoming. “Decoding the Digitalization of Urban Governance in India: Policy, People and Processes of the Smart Cities Mission and the National Urban Digital Mission.” Centre for Policy Research: New Delhi, India.
Praharaj, Sarbeswar. 2020. “Development challenges for big data command and control centres for smart cities in India.” In Nimish Biloria (ed) Data-driven Multivalence in the Built Environment. 75–90. Springer.
Praharaj, Sarbeswar, and Hoon Han. 2019. “Cutting through the Clutter of Smart City Definitions: A Reading into the Smart City Perceptions in India.” City, Culture and Society 18:100289. 1–10.
Prasad, Deepti, and Tooran Alizadeh. 2020. “What Makes Indian Cities Smart? A Policy Analysis of Smart Cities Mission.” Telematics and Informatics 55:101466. 1–15.
Prasad, Deepti, Tooran Alizadeh, and Robyn Dowling. 2021. “Multiscalar Smart City Governance in India.” Geoforum 121: 173–80.
———. 2022. “Smart City Place-Based Outcomes in India: Bubble Urbanism and Socio-Spatial Fragmentation.” Journal of Urban Design 00(00): 1–21.
Purandare, Uttara. 2021. “Who Drives India’s Smart Cities? Understanding the Role Of Consulting Firms in the Smart Cities Mission.” In Chris Hurl and Anne Vogenpohl (eds) Professional Service Firms and Politics in a Global Era: Public Policy, Private Expertise. 79–96. Springer.
Taraporevala, Persis. 2018. “Demystifying the Indian Smart City.” Centre for Policy Research: New Delhi, India, 1-35.

9th September 2022

Established in 1973, Centre for Policy Research is a non-profit, non-partisan independent institution, dedicated to conducting research that contributes to high quality scholarship, better policies and a more robust public discourse. As one of 24 research institutes of the Indian Council of Social Sciences Research network, CPR has all requisite approvals and sanctions, and is authorised by the government as a recipient under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act.

The Income Tax Department visited our office to undertake a survey of CPR on 7th and 8th September 2022. We have extended full cooperation to the department during the survey, and will continue to do so in the future.

We hold ourselves to the highest standards of compliance and are confident that we have done nothing wrong. We are committed to working with the authorities to address any questions they might have.

We remain committed to our mission to provide rigorous research to policy making in India.

On behalf of CPR:

Yamini Aiyar
President and Chief Executive
Centre for Policy Research