HABfTATII,YTL. Vol. 17. No. I. pp. 117-132. lYY3 OlY7-3975193 $6.00 + 0.

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Printed in Great Britain 0 1993 Pergamon Press Ltd

Inner City Renewal

Lessons from the Indian Experience*

GITA DEWAN VERMA

New Delhi, India

The rapid growth of cities in recent decades has put urban planners in an
uneviable position of ‘desperately trying to cope’, a position that has made
for a tendency to place the problems of urban development in a perspective of
quantity rather than quality, of provision rather than upkeep. A preoccupation
with the design and development of new areas has come to be typical of
planning agencies throughout the developing world. Whenever upgrading works
are carried out, it is as one-time projects conceived as cheaper substitutes
for providing new housing. This apart, maintenance and upkeep of existing,
particularly old, areas has been relegated to the back seat.
This has at least something to do with the relative simplicity of tasks of
planning new developments as compared to the intimidatingly complex nature
of issues related to interventions for old areas. These include, in addition to
the more comprehensible problems relating to structure and infrastructure and
falling within the domain of ‘housing planning’, a number of lesser understood
problems relating to market factors, redevelopment interests, rent control, etc.,
and falling out of this domain into the wider area of ‘urban planning’. Inner
city renewal interventions currently in practice in countries such as India are,
indeed, geared to the ‘housing planning’ rather than the ‘urban planning’
dimension of the inner city problem and are conceived not very differently
from, say, upgrading strategies for squatter areas or substandard peripheral
developments.
While conventional upgrading is undoubtedly an important part of inner city
renewal, it is, nevertheless, only a part. Interventions in inner city areas need to
include much more and, in paying due attention to this wider comprehension,
to include conventional components in not so conventional ways. What such
interventions could be like is the subject of this article which appraises India’s
experience with inner city renewal through two case studies, analysing the
basic factors constraining better performance, and delineating a framework for
addressing the inner city problem.

AN APPRAISAL OF THE INDIAN EXPERIENCE

In 1981 there were, in old housing areas throughout India, as many as 1.2 million
dwelling units,’ representing nearly a twentieth of the total housing stock and

*This article is based on the author’s work in 1989 for the 53rd International Course on Housing Planning
and Building at the Institute for Housing Studies, Rotterdam, which was published as Inner&y Decay and
Rewal in India: a Framework for Addressing the Problem, by the Centre for Asian Studies, Amsterdam
in 1990, and which formed the basis of subsequent research by the author on “Institutional Arrangements
for Inner City Renewal” carried out with financial support from the Housing and Urban Development
Corporation (HUDCO) under the Indian Human Settlements Programme (IHSP) research cycle.

HAB17:1-I 117
118 Gita Dewan Verma

accommodating, perhaps, nearly 10 million people. Over years of socio-cultural

and political changes, these areas have experienced tremendous transformations
and have come to demonstrate some typical characteristics. The ageing housing
stock is often in structurally poor condition due to a combination of factors
including age, inadequate maintenance and the pressures of overuse. On account
of intense sub-divisions, the occupancy rates are high and overcrowding and
small units are typical. There is usually a large amount of rental stock. Physical
infrastructure does exist but, designed for few and used by many, it is usually
stressed and the dense, sometimes organic, patterns of development may be
unable to accommodate extensions. Intensive mixed land uses are characteristic
and most inner city areas are major economic centres. The scale of commerce is
usually large and turnover is high, but, paradoxically, the residents are generally
low-income and often engaged in informal sector activities, usually home-based
and having strong horizontal inter-linkages. On account of traffic congestion and
pollution and of incompatible land uses there may be serious environmental
problems. Also, inner city areas often have a bad track record with regard to
communal politics, riots and high crime rates.
The earliest interventions affecting Indian inner cities, apart from the some-
what inconsequential road widening and beautification schemes of the City
Improvement Trusts, were, perhaps, Rent Control and Slum legislation. In
most cities, the Rent Control Act is the greatest, if not the exclusive, instance of
public sector intervention in inner city areas. There is no doubt that the measure,
by maintaining rents at affordable levels, has helped stabilise low-income groups
in residential neighbourhoods which they would have otherwise lost. However,
several negative effects are generally accepted2 and, arguably, rent control has
contributed to poor maintenance of old housing stock, seriously compounding
the inner city problem. Slum legislation also occupies a central place in the urban
renewal scenario of the country and a number of earlier Master Plan documents
labelled their inner city areas ‘slums’ and proposed clearance and improvement
programmes for them. These programmes, conceived no differently from other
such programmes, inadequately addressed both the wider urban context and the
special urban heritage of inner city areas. Though the 1960s saw a tremendous
interest in conservation and a number of Master Plans started talking of the
bypassing, by major city arteries, of old areas and even pedestrianising some
areas around major focal points in them, the focus here was on physical
conservation, somewhat narrowly confined to more important buildings. On
paper, India’s experience in the domain of ‘urban renewal’ as such can, perhaps,
be traced to the Master Plan for Delhi (1962) which spelt out an urban renewal
programme for its walled city. 3 A number of master plans have subsequently
made recommendations on similar lines. A number of cities have designated
their inner cities as special areas and stipulated for them special development
controls or urban renewal measures. In some cases, special authorities have
been created. But nowhere has a comprehensive renewal programme been
implemented.
Discussed here are two of India’s earliest renewal programmes: the building
repair and reconstruction programme in Bombay, which takes a building-by-
building approach to address the problems of obsolescence and dilapidation in
the island city; and the proposals for the renewal of the walled city of Delhi,
which, by and large, take an area-based approach, attempting to address inner
city problems on a broader footing.

The Bombay case

The area currently known as Greater Bombay, delineated as such in 1951,
consists of the island city of Bombay and the suburban areas, extending over
 Inner City Renewal 119

438 km2 with an estimated population of 10 million4 A large section of the city’s
poor live in &awls, which largely constitute dilapidated housing in Bombay, and
which are referred to here as its inner city housing, though strictly speaking,
they are to be found as often outside the core city as well. Chawls date back
to the turn of the century when large numbers of single migrant labourers
were accommodated, in the absence of a planned housing strategy, largely
by the private sector, in small single or two-roomed tenements with common
facilities. Though each unit paid a small rent, the aggregate of these rents was
sufficiently high to make such housing supply attractive to the private sector.
After the turn of the century, the Port Trust also started constructing similar
housing for renting to its employees. Per capita space was low and density
high to start with, but shortage resulted in further overcrowding. Also, most
migrants brought their families. Thus structure and facilities, designed for a few
and used by many, began to deteriorate much faster than would have been the
case normally and dilapidation has come to be a pervasive phenomenons and
every year over 100 buildings collapse.
In 1969, the state government enacted the Bombay Building Repairs and
Reconstruction Board (BBRRB) Act whereby the BBRRB was set up, with
representation of the Bombay Municipal Corporation (BMC) and the State
Housing Board, as a means for preserving, through ensuring timely repairs or
reconstruction, the existing housing stock in the areas covered by the Act and
cessed under its provisions. 6 The Board’s scope of intervention extends to three
areas: (1) repairs of cessed buildings provided the cost of repairs is within
the ceiling limit prescribed by the act; (2) reconstruction of cessed buildings
deemed beyond economic repair; and (3) provision of transit accommodation to
occupiers of cessed buildings that collapse or are under repair/reconstruction.
For carrying out structural repairs to cessed buildings, an area-wise priority
list is prepared based on a routine appraisal of dilapidated buildings by
the BMC, besides suggestions from residents, their associations and elected
representatives. If the estimated cost of repairs is within the limit prescribed
in the Act, or if the occupiers come forward to bear the excess cost, the Board
undertakes repairs. Only affected parts of buildings are repaired and parts of
buildings are only replaced if strictly necessary. Moreover, as occupiers are
generally not willing to move to transit accommodation as this entails disruption
of routine activities, and also because transit accommodation is limited, every
effort is made to carry out the works without significantly displacing the
occupiers. Generally about 700 buildings are repaired each year.7 The Act
also provides for repairs to be undertaken by the occupiers (landlords or
tenants or both in partnership). While the majority of buildings have been
repaired by the Board, the number of buildings repaired by occupants is by
no means insignificant.8
Reconstruction schemes are prepared for buildings deemed beyond economic
repair and have to provide for a floor area occupied by the tenants subject to a
maximum limit of 68 m2 and a minimum of 15.86 m2 in units with common WCs
and 16.70 m* in self-contained units. Relaxations to the development control
rules have been introduced, permitting higher tenement densities, additional
building height and greater FSI. In cases where the plot is small in area or narrow
in width so that a building cannot be planned, a combined reconstruction scheme
may be prepared by including adjoining plots. 9 Once a reconst~ction scheme is
administratively approved and land acquisition proceedings are completed, the
reconstruction work is started. Reconstructed buildings are usually conventional
RCC frame structures with brick panel walls. The units are allotted to the old
occupiers on a rental basis. The Act also provides for granting ‘No-objection
certificates’ (NOC)re to owners for reconstruction (subject to a number of
conditions, mainly that all existing tenants be accommodated in the proposed
120 Gita Dewan Verma

reconstructed building), or to a cooperative society formed by at least 70% of

the occupiers, which is expected to raise 40% of the estimated cost and the
Board arranges the rest as a loan from the Housing and Urban Development
Corporation (HUDCO), a national level housing finance institution.11
Several procedural problems are encountered in the implementation of the
BBRRP. In the repair programme, it is, to begin with, very difficult to have a
‘priority list’ based upon sound structural analysis as it is practically impossible
to thoroughly survey, in the entire inner city, structural members that are often
hidden in the thickness of the walls, and there is, besides, the ‘non-technical’
problem that every ward must have a ‘fair’ share of the buildings on the priority
list. Another problem is whether to remove tenants to transit accommodation
(thereby disrupting their socio-economic linkages) or to let them stay (thereby
slowing down the pace of the work). Perhaps the most serious problems pertain
to post-programme maintenance. The assumption that repairs add 15 years to
the life of a building presupposes a fair level of maintenance which seldom
comes about and, in many cases, buildings have come for second or third rounds
of repairs much earlier, and sometimes even collapsed.
Reconstruction schemes are often faced with inordinate delays and bottle-
necks: land acquisition (and litigation), technical approvals for plans, refusal
of tenants to vacate, etc. Besides, they entail problems relating to public
sector landlordism. Non-payment of rents is common and a survey in the
mid-1980s revealed that a majority of families had rent arrears.12 Again,
maintenance is generally neglected and reconstructed buildings start looking
like dilapidated ones in a few years. In fact, while it is often argued that
repairs are temporary solutions which just postpone reconstruction, experience
has shown that reconstruction is also far from a permanent solution inasmuch
as many reconstructed buildings are soon due for repairs.
In many cases the Board’s transit tenements are also in need of repairs.
Also, since transit accommodation is mostly in suburban locations, people are
generally unwilling to move to it, more so since the size of accommodation is
on a reduced scale. In any case, the 22,477 transit tenements that the Board has
represent about a fifth of the estimated requirement for transit accommodationis
and the financial and land resources needed to improve this state of affairs are
hard to come by.
Besides these procedural problems there are certain broader limitations of
the BBRRP. To begin with, the programme is somewhat narrowly limited in
scope, not only in the sense of taking a limited perspective of the inner city
problem (to which I shall return in the next part of this article) but of further
confining scope within the limited perspective. For instance, the programme
is confined to the island city while the massive suburban areas also contain
tenanted buildings requiring repairs. It does not cover buildings belonging to
public agencies, although these are in no better condition than others. It is
restricted to residential buildings and purely commercial buildings are exempted
from cess. In fact, many buildings that were assessed earlier have been de-
cessed on grounds of change in use. Their need for repairs is not likely to have
mitigated though. Again, in specifying a target of about 20,000 buildings to be
repaired in 10 years, the programme takes a static view of a problem which, in
fact, is not likely to disappear ever. For instance, some buildings constructed
in the 1970s are already in need of repairs and others repaired by the Board
have been through, or are ready for, a second or even third round of repairs.
A major problem pertains to serious constraints of finance. As per the
provisions of the Act, the Board receives a grant from the BMC and one
from the State Government, besides contributions by way of ad hoc grants
and loans.14 Other sources of the Board’s finances are the repair cess that
it recovers from buildings covered by the Act and the rent that it recovers
 Inner City Renewal 121

from tenements in reconstructed buildings. The cess, calculated on a differential

scale based upon the age of the building and its rateable value (as assessed
for purposes of property tax) and liable for increase after repairs, is not very
efficiently recovered and arrears are high.15 The rent, though heavily subsidised,
is often much higher than what the tenants paid to the private landlords, and
rent recovery is very poor, falling short of even maintenance expenses, let
alone recovering capital costs .i6 Presently the funds generated from municipal
and state contributions and cess recoveries are of the order of one-tenth of the
funds required. 17
It may be pertinent to mention here that the problems and limitations noted
above have, indeed, received the attention of the programme agencies and
the BBRRP had been modified time and again to make it more effective.
To improve the financial situation, both the statutory contributions of the
municipal and state agencies and the amounts of cess recoverable have been
enhanced periodically. The provision for repairs/reconstruction by beneficiaries
under the NOC arrangement was also incorporated in an attempt to reduce the
burden on the Board. The provision for transfer of reconstructed tenements to
occupants on a cooperative ownership has also been recently introduced with
a view to divest the Board of maintenance responsibilities and other problems
of public sector landlordism. In a different direction, an attempt at an area
approach in terms of renewal of a group of dilapidated buildings along with
infrastructural upgradation has also been forthcoming. These modifications
have, however, yet to make a substantial impact on the scheme of things and
their efficacy remains constrained by a number of other issues that continue to
await addressal. For instance, in view of poor recovery, enhanced cess has
served to increase outstandings more than resources, the lack of any substantial
incentives has constrained the involvement of owners/occupants in, especially,
reconstruction activity, the absence of reasonable terms of allotment on owner-
ship basis, together with the low rents and de-facto ownership of publicly rented
tenements, has resulted in very few takers for the ownership provision, and the
area approach, though sound in principle, has not taken off because of several
institutional constraints. The last mentioned is also demonstrated by the Delhi
case, which is discussed next.

The Delhi case

With a population of 5.7 million in the 1981 census, Delhi is the third
largest metropolis in India and the capital of the country. Its walled city
(Shahjahanabad) was built in the seventeenth century as the Mughal capital
and continues to be a major housing sub-system to date. Originally planned
for a population of about 60,000 people in a residential area of about 600 ha,
Shahjahanabad bustles with all kinds of ‘unintended’ activities, its exclusive
residential area reduced to about 180 ha and its population increased manifold,
and plays a significant economic role as a major distribution centre for North
India.18 Though the population of the walled city has declined in recent
decades, the invasion of built space by commercial activity has been faster
than the depopulation and there are serious overcrowding problems. About
half the households live in one-roomed and a third in two-roomed houses.19
Also, though the walled city employs some 350,000 persons and has an annual
turnover in billions*0 and is, as such, quite a money spinner, it is primarily a
city of the poor and nearly two-thirds of the workers are engaged in tertiary
occupations, largely in the informal sector.21
The Master Plan For Dehli (MPD-1962) spelled out a comprehensive renewal
strategy for the walled city, quantifying, through multiple indexing, the degree
of deterioration and obsolescence, to identify areas for conservation, for
122 Gita Dewan Verma

rehabilitation, and for redevelopment. 22 Careful and judicious relocation was

seen as ‘an important link between these three major components of urban
renewal’.23 Obnoxious and village-like industries were proposed to be relocated
in urban villages, other industries in flatted factories, and the population
rendered surplus by the urban renewal operations in housing which was
proposed in the vicinity of the walled city. The land that would become available
as a result of these relocation measures was to be used for provision of essential
community facilities. The Slum Wing24 was charged with implementing the
urban renewal programme described in the MPD. The Ministry for Rehabilita-
tionzs transferred to it about 2600 evacuee properties in the walled city for use
for provision of community facilities. The Wing has undertaken improvements
in about 650 km-as,26 a few redevelopment schemes, construction of 716
resettlement tenements, some transit accommodation, some night shelters,
shifting of a cycle market and a dozen or more industries.27 Proposals for
shifting activities have met with very limited success and on the whole, progress
has been slow to the point of negligible impact. 2s While concern for the walled
city continued to be voiced in several ‘unofficial’ quarters, it was not until
1981, when the MPD became due for revision, that the Delhi Development
Authority (DDA) took an initiative at reviewing the problem. In the last few
years, proposals have come from two quarters, viz, the Perspective Planning
Wing of the DDA and the Slum Wing of the DDA.
In September 1984, the Perspective Planning Wing (PPW) of the DDA,
acknowledging that extreme approaches like restoration, reconstruction or
relocation are not likely to work, outlined a basic policy frame and action plan
covering five aspects: (i) commercial decongestion, (ii) upgrading of physical
and social infrastructure, (iii) traffic and transport regulation and management,
(iv) conservation and restoration of historical buildings, and (v) revitalisation
of residential area. Some prerequisites for action were summarised, and a
development code, a list of activities to be removed and a phased estimate
were annexed.29 In a seminar in January 1986, the recommendations and the
action plan were reiterated. 30 Subsequently some of the proposals were spelt
out in greater detail.31
It can be argued that any discussion of problems and limitations of a proposed
action plan is at best conjectural. But, to the extent that the action plan does not
significantly depart from what was proposed more than a quarter-century ago in
the MPD, it is possible to make some remarks about the implementability of the
various proposals. Regarding commercial decongestion, it is proposed to shift
noxious, hazardous and bulk-handling trades and industries from the walled
city (which, besides being an unqualified repetition of what was proposed in
the MPD-1962, contradicts one of the premises of the current proposal, viz,
‘extreme approaches like . . . relocation of trade are not likely to work’), to
stop further expansion of the wholesale activity (which could be a reasonable
starting point, but which, unfortunately, does not even feature in the proposed
time frame), to develop modern wholesale markets in four peripheral locations
(which, being potentially remunerative ventures, are, sooner or later, likely
to come through, but which are as likely to accommodate activities displaced
from the walled city as to end up with unintended beneficiaries, as has often
happened in the works of the DDA), and to shift the offices of the Municipal
Corporation of Delhi and to use the building for ‘museum, library, etc.’ (which,
arguably, would not significantly contribute to resolving the main problems
faced by the walled city).
Regarding upgrading of infrastructure, it is proposed to make water supply
and sewage connections mandatory in the walled city (which, given an enforce-
ment machinery that cannot even deter unlicensed rickshaws, vendors and
encroachers, seems far too ambitious), and to redevelop dilapidated k~t~~~ to
 Inner City Renewal 123

provide space for multi-facility buildings, social infrastructure and open spaces
(which was also proposed in the MPD-1962 and which, if anything, is less
implementable today inasmuch as presently most of the dilapidated k&us are
extensively squatted upon, there is not enough land in the vicinity of the walled
city to rehabilitate all these families, and the ‘social dynamics of this type of
katru exhibit an indifferent approach and negative attitude, with little interest in
participating in government programmes or responding to institutions involved
in such intervention’.32
Regarding traffic and transport, a number of actions have been suggested
including restricting entry to heavy vehicles, development of peripheral parking
lots for cars, development of pedestrian paths, restricting animal-driven and
manual-driven vehicles, etc. (which have been recommended time and again by
traffic and related departments but resisted by strong pressure groups).
Regarding conservation of historical buildings, it is proposed to list all
historical monuments and buildings of architectural interest and to develop
a tourist pedestrian path connecting them (a proposal that is, quite clearly,
implementable without much problem, but which, equally clearly, is likely to
have minimal impact on the main problems of the inner city).
Regarding revitalisation of residential areas, it is proposed to ‘rebuild the
walled city in the same form and architectural style as existing’ (a proposal
that reflects the authors’ preoccupation with design aspects which, however
desirable they may be considered, hardly qualify to be treated as singular issues
of residential revitalisation).
On the whole, although many of the actions proposed by the Perspective
Planning Wing of the DDA are undoubtedly necessary, the proposal is not
substantially different from that of the MPD-1962 and does not seem to have
progressed any further in the matter of operational guidelines and may well
suffer the same fate.
In 1987-1988, the Slum Wing (SW) of the DDA sponsored a study on the
renewal of katras. The study 33 identified three types of katraS4 and, based
on detailed socio-economic surveys in three of one type (‘typical katras’) and
an intensive physical survey in one, concluded first, that it is both desirable
and feasible to improve living conditions of katra residents while retaining
existing buildings and the urban fabric of the walled city, and second, that
this should be achieved through physical and institutional innovations, in
combination with tenure change and collective responsibility, thus securing
not only short-term rehabilitation but long-term maintenance and continued
upgrading with minimum demand on public resources. For the katra studied
in detail, it proposed to retain and improve the buildings, to build a container
structure to support an additional floor and to include some upgradating of
existing infrastructure. Regarding implementation, it proposed that a Katra
Project Unit (KPU) be established in the SW and an appropriate and capable
non-governmental organisation (NGO) be identified and mobilised to organise
a Housing Society (HS) to be the principal intermediary in the rehabilitation
process and to continue afterwards as a residents’ association. The HS, the
NGO and the KPU would finalise the physical/economic feasibility of the
project by refining the katru project proposals; the KPU would proceed with
contracting, secure HUDCO loan, finalise with the HS the buyers’ costs and
arrangements regarding down payments and subsequent repayments, and hand
over the finished work to the HS; the HS would be responsible for routine
repairs/maintenance of the collective fabric; and, as the HS develops, the NGO
would withdraw and, hopefully, proceed to the next katra.
The proposals of the SW, DDA cover two areas - physical proposal and
‘institutional innovation’. The physical proposal may well be technically sound.
But it is a proposal for one out of 7000 katras. Of course it is intended as a
124 Gita Dewan Verma

‘demonstration project’, but it seems to have been designed more as a one-time

‘project’ than as a replicable ‘demonstration’. There appears to be no attempt
at looking at or planning for conditions that will facilitate this demonstration
effect, even in the most general terms. Nor is there any discussion of the fact
that the problem is ‘diverse’ rather than ‘general’, beyond a brief mention that
there exist, in a fair proportion, katra types other than the one whose section
the project represents. The ‘institutional innovation’ intended is ‘a collaborative
relationship between three development actors’ - the KPU, the HS (to be
mobilised) and the NGO (to be identified), but just how earnest the authors
are about this ‘collaborative relationship’ is clear from the fact that such a
detailed physical proposal has been made even when two of the actors have yet
to be identified. Even assuming that this collaboration will come together, the
‘innovation’ is located in a very narrow area of overall institutional arrangements
required by the problem and although it is an essential part, it is nevertheless
only a small part. To begin with, the very fact that two wings of the same agency
have put out two concurrent proposals which have no reference to each other
illustrates the implementation problems that may be expected.

AN ANALYSIS OF CONSTRAINTS

The intention here is not to exhaustively summarise all procedural problems

or to analyse specific factors constraining better performance of renewal pro-
grammes, but rather to pursue two basic pre-requisites for their procedural
streamlining: (i) unambiguous procedural definition, and (ii) adequate con-
sideration of wider issues over and above manifest problems of inner city
decay.

The problem of ambiguous solutions to a complex problem

Ambiguous procedural definition is, typically, not so much a characteristic of
building-oriented approaches as of area-oriented approaches. In the case of
Bombay, for instance, procedural definition is, perhaps, unambiguous in a
technical sense inasmuch as procedural requirements of building repairs and
reconstruction are, indeed, understood. Furthermore, unlike many other cases,
building regulations have been suitably relaxed. In the case of Delhi, on the
other hand, the sequence of interventions in terms of what happens first, what
follows what, what must necessarily be accompanied by what and so on, is far
from clear. The PPW, DDA, for example, specifies the absolute time frame for
each action recommended, but a sequential phasing of actions is conspicuously
absent .ss
Ambiguity becomes a serious limitation in the face of institutional arrange-
ments that are typically not geared towards implementing anything but simply
and unambiguously designed projects. In Delhi, for instance, the renewal
programme has been under the auspices of the Slum Wing which, irrespective
of its capabilities or otherwise for undertaking minor upgrading works, quite
simply does not have the expertise to handle the programme in its entirety.
The institutional dimension of the problem of katra renewal is, perhaps,
“‘the absence of a development agent’, which implies an entity with sufficient
resources, skills and motivation to maintain and transform katrd.36
A salient effect of the absence of clearly defined planning procedures is that
renewal interventions are vulnerable to interference by various interest groups
which find it easy to influence details of implementation to their advantage.
In Delhi, proposals in respect of redevelopment and relocation have hardly
been implemented on account, largely, of political interference, and ‘urban
 Inner City Renewal 125

renewal’ has been restricted to politically less sensitive areas such as minor
upgrading works. Of course political interference is not unique to inner city
areas nor to ambiguously defined planning procedures and what is suggested
here is certainly not a cause-effect relationship between ambiguous procedural
definition on the one hand and political interference on the other. Rather the
simple point is made that ambiguity makes for greater vulnerability to politically
manifest interference by various interest groups and that this can become a
serious problem in inner city areas where often conflicting interest groups are
juxtaposed.
Das (1983)x7 enumerates five such conflict areas which hamper inner city
renewal interventions. First, there is a conflict between property owners and
property users located in the interest of the former in putting the property
back into the open market for redevelopment and of the latter in struggling
for survival in the inner city. Second, there is a conflict between residential
and commercial interests which surfaces when the ‘naturally evolved balance’
between various uses, established in inner cities in the initial stages of their
organic evolution, comes to be disrupted. Third, there is a conflict between
‘housing objectives’ and ‘overall urban planning objectives’ arising from the fact
that while “housing agencies, ‘authorities’ or ‘boards’ look for alternatives such
as ‘cheap’ residential redevelopments, building repairs and upgrading . . . over-
all urban objectives inescapably fall into setting alternatives based on ‘optimal’
use of high-value land”. Fourth, there exists, within both the public and the
private sector, a conflict between objectives on the one hand and capacity on
the other. Fifth, there is a conflict between planning intention and political will
which manifests itself in a lack of political will to undertake major reforms that
planners perceive as necessary.
As long as such conflicts exist, clearly defined procedures are necessary. More
than this, and in a sense detracting from it, these conflicts have to be adequately
addressed since even the most precisely defined procedures cannot make up for
inadequate responses. No amount of procedural precision of solutions is likely
to have any substantive impact on the inner city problem as long as solutions
are sought within inner cities (since many conflicts are embedded in factors
transcending inner city boundaries) and as long as inner city renewal is viewed as
a purely retrospective planning area (without integrating the inner city problem
perspective into prospective city-wide planning).

Problems in inner cities and problems of inner cities

Let us look, for instance, at the interests of users and of owners of properties.
Of course, solutions in respect of compromising the interests of property users
and owners can be, and indeed are, found within inner city areas (such as
through land sharing). However, these possibilities are limited, particularly in
cases of extreme concentration and it could be useful to seek solutions in a
wider city framework. For instance, residential relocation could be linked to
job relocation or to a policy for allowing home-based enterprises. Likewise, it
could be tried to compromise the redevelopment interests of property owners
by buying them out with compensation in terms of real estate elsewhere, say,
in case of Bombay, in the New Bombay project area or, in the case of Delhi,
in one of the district or sub-district centres being developed by the DDA.
Likewise, procedural problems related to commercial decongestion, delimit-
ing non-residential uses, and such like interventions should be seen against the
fact that the unabated concentration of non-residential activities in inner city
areas is linked, in a self-perpetuating cycle, to making them commercially
attractive locations. This is an inevitable outcome of the typical city-wide mixed
land-use dynamics in which needs arising out of the inadequate development of
126 Gita Dewan Verma

non-residential use zones are met by their differential emergence in different

types of residential areas .ss Inner city areas are, typically, ones to become most
intensively and extensively mixed. This has implications for both retrospective
and prospective planning for inner city areas. First, solutions to procedural
problems regarding decongestion and relocation have to be sought through
adequately linking commercial relocation and residential resettlement. Second,
city-wide zoning practices need to be more responsive.
The matter of resource constraints, in the typical Third World context, is not
a problem unique to interventions in inner city areas. However, in the face of
inadequate resources, it becomes all too easy for renewal to be reduced not
only in coverage (which is the usual result of resource constraints) but also,
and more important, in scope. Cheaper solutions come to be preferred -
repairs vs reconstruction, upgradation vs redevelopment - even when they
are not appropriate or not adequate. Of course, resource constraints are
not the sole criterion for such choices which are largely the result of wider
policy perspective of the problem. However, with inadequate resources, these
choices can be, and indeed are, easily made, not least of all because cheaper
solutions are often politically less sensitive. It is important to note that such
choices are different from a choice between, say, sites-and-services and built
housing because prospective interventions can be viewed in terms of singular
options whereas retrospective interventions generally need to be by way of more
complex combinations.
An important point regarding resource constraints for inner city renewal is
that there appears to be a singular lack of effort at resource mobilisation. On
the one hand, issues of cost recovery and tenure (which is closely related to cost
recovery and post programme maintenance) have received notably less attention
than in other interventions. This has at least something to do with the different
perceptions of retrospective and prospective interventions, a notion that the
former should be largely government responsibility. On the other hand, there is
a persistent paradox pertaining to the resource potential that inner cities afford.
They are ‘money spinners’, yet their turnover does not contribute towards their
improvement. Interventions in them have possibilities of cross subsidy, but these
are seldom adequately exploited. In a sense it appears that where inner city
interventions should be viewed the same as other interventions, they are viewed
differently (cost recovery and tenure issues) and where they should be viewed
as different they are viewed similarly (resource potential).
A question that is vital to this discussion of resource constraints is to what
extent should renewal be a purely public sector intervention? This, indeed,
is a basic question related to the resource constraints of the public sector in
general. In the case of inner cities, the role of the private sector - users,
owners, entrepreneurs - assumes even greater significance as compromising
their interest is closely linked to procedural streamlining.
It should be clear from the foregoing discussion that many of the things
that hamper inner city interventions are located in city-wide factors. Their
resolution, so essential to resolving the inner city crisis, has, accordingly, to be
addressed in a city-wide perspective. Some of the factors, such as the interests of
users and owners of property and the matter of resource constraints within the
public sector have direct implications for procedural definition and for resource
mobilisation for retrospective interventions for inner city renewal. Others, such
as aspects related to the concentration of non-residential activities in inner
city areas and to reconciling inner city and city planning have, in addition,
implications for wider prospective planning. The important point here is that
to the extent that even procedural streamlining is not adequately possible within
a narrow perspective, a wider view is not only desirable but necessary, and
approaches to inner city renewal need to be substantially broader based.
 Inner City Renewal 127

THREE LEVELS FOR ADDRESSING INNER CITY DECAY AND RENEWAL

In the literature, the terms ‘housing renewal’ and ‘urban renewal’ are used
interchangeably. Area approaches to housing renewal, in particular, are usually
referred to as urban renewal approaches. This article has favoured the term
‘inner city renewal’ because, in a sense, the terms ‘housing’ and ‘urban’
connote different levels of viewing the problem, while the term ‘inner city’
represents more closely the problem per se. ‘Urban renewal’ ought, perhaps, to
address inner city problems in a wider city-level framework and, inasmuch, the
Bombay and Delhi cases respectively illustrate, essentially, a building-oriented
and an area-oriented approach to housing renewal. Besides addressing, as
these approaches do, issues pertaining to housing, or housing and related
infrastructure, inner city renewal should aim at securing a balanced mixed land
use pattern to ensure sufficient economic opportunity to residents while not
unduly hindering the residential function. The specific nature of interventions
would vary. For instance, in areas with declining traditional occupations and/or
stagnating economies, economic revitalisation would become an important goal.
If, on the other hand, there is acute commercial congestion the goal would
be economic de-vitalisation or, at least deIimitation. Such an approach which
considers, besides housing and related (infrastructure) problems, other urban
functions of inner cities could be considered an area approach to urban renewal.
Retrospective interventions in respect of housing or urban renewal would be
considerably expedited by prospective planning interventions to control or slow
down inner city decay. This prospective renewal, so to speak, could be a third
level for addressing the inner city problem.

Retrospective interventions: housing and related problems

Interventions directed at upgrading structural and environmental conditions,
falling in the domain of an area based approach to housing renewal, have
received reasonable attention in literature and are discussed only briefly here,
in terms not of choices and details of techniques (repairs vs reconstruction,
conservation vs rehabilitation or redevelopment, etc.), but of some generalisable
issues pertaining to implementation: some aspects of community involvement
and tenurial and financial matters.
The potential of users’ initiative in making inner city renewal strategies
successful is being widely acknowledged. This is largely on the ‘rebound’
as a result of problems, in the absence of community participation, with
implementation (scarce resources and elusive ‘neighbourhood impacts’) and
post-implementation aspects (maintenance and cost recovery). Neighbourhood
organisations have come to be viewed as a way out of difficulties involved
in granting tenure or channeling funds to the inner city poor while avoiding
mechanisms of their de-stabilisation. Thus collective tenurial arrangements and
subsidies or other forms of financial assistance to residents’ organisations rather
than to individual households are being increasingly advocated.39 in Bombay,
there is a shift, after nearly two decades of programme implementation, in this
direction. In Delhi, the katru project proposals envisage this at the out-start.
The issue of community participation, in principle, can hardly be argued. But
it may be remarked here that, all too often ‘enlisting’ community participation
is tantamount more to ‘using’ the community than to ‘involving’ the community.
This is substantively exemplified by the case of Delhi where, after detailed
technical proposals have been drawn out, an NGO has yet to be identified
to mobilise a residents’ association, and there seems, besides, a conspicuous
lack of attention to how this community participation is to be operationalised
in that while the proposal regarding implementation exhaustively lists various
128 Gita Dewan Verma

procedural stages subsequent to ‘identifying a suitable NGO’ to ‘mobilise a

housing society’, there is no mention of who is to take responsibility for this
and how it is to be carried out. In fact, the proposal has not taken off largely
because of this very reason.

Retrospective interventions: other urban functions

Interventions falling in the domain of an area approach to urban renewal need
to include, besides those relating to structural and infrastructural upgradation,
those pertaining to other typical problems such as removal of incompatable
uses, decongestion through residential relocation and, related to these, the
countering of redevelopment interests of property owners.
Some amount of relocation is indeed vital to resolving problems of inner city
areas which are invariably characterised by some form of congestion or other.
The main problem in this regard is that inner city activities are inextricably
inter-linked in ways that are little understood. There are, for instance, linkages
between enterprises that are typical to the small firm type of economy and
that require physical propinquity. There are also linkages between work and
residence which low-income households in general, and those engaged in home-
based or traditional occupations in particular, find crucial for their economic
survival. Then, of course, there are linkages with consumers/customers forged
over long periods of time. All these linkages influence, in great measure,
popular perception of ‘incompatible’ uses which, in general, has formed the
basis of planning decisions regarding non-residential relocation. The removal
of incompatible uses is, undoubtedly, essential to securing a better quality
of residential life. But an important issue in this regard pertains to what
constitutes ‘noxious’ and ‘objectionable’. Decisions by city authorities in this
regard are based on predetermined criteria which do not make allowances for
popular sanctions. “The result could be stifling in terms of people’s aspirations
and unrealistic in terms of their requirements . . . obnoxious industries and
activities ought to be redefined in terms of residents’ preferences”.40 But again,
popular preferences and vested interests are not often easily distinguishable.
This has implications for some form of community participation which affords
an adequate forum for public hearings in which vested interest groups are not
overly represented, which of course is easier said than done.
Again, it simply may not be possible to decentralise certain activities. One
example relates to efforts at relocating wholesale activities in the cases of
Delhi and Bombay. In Delhi, attempts at de-centralising wholesale markets
in different zones of the city have not succeeded whereas in Bombay, where
a new wholesale centre is simply replacing an existing one, there are some signs
of success.41 This is not to suggest that complete relocation is the only way but
rather to demonstrate the complexity of the problem.
At this level, a wider framework of addressing the inner city problem in its
wider urban context becomes important. One possibility regarding relocation,
explicitly or implicitly advocated very often, is to relocate to proximate locations.
Besides the constrained availability of land in central locations, efforts in this
regard usually suffer from some other typical problems. One problem area
relates to design and management aspects. The design of relocation projects,
more often than not, does not respond well to the behavioural tendencies of
users. In the case of Delhi, for instance, the housing provided by the Slum
Wing to house families relocated from redevelopment projects in the walled city
was largely unacceptable to users as it failed to adequately accommodate their
(residential and other) activities. Also, development of new areas and shifting
of activities are often not sufficiently coordinated and the new developments,
on account of their central location, become prone to ‘turnover’. Another
 Inner City Renewal 129

problem pertains to what could be considered an artificial unavailability of

land. In Hyderabad, for instance, nearly a sixth of the land in the inner city
is vacant, and therefore available in physical terms. However, on account of
inadequate/ineffective legislative devices, it is not available in real terms. Divest
of these problems, which are management issues that can and ought to be
resolved, this possibility, although limited, is indeed useful.
Another, perhaps less limited, possibility is to combine delimitation with
measures to secure voluntary relocation by entrepreneurs and residents. In the
case of Delhi, for instance, the idea of delimiting non-residential activity to its
present level has been proposed. 42 It has, however, not been pursued in detail.
The approach is in a sense politically less sensitive, and therefore more viable
in terms of implementability, than forced relocation. But, perhaps, it has yet
to ‘be got used to’ by planners, implementors and inner city communities. The
same applies to voluntary relocation. An awareness and willingness has to be
stimulated. At the same time, real options need to be created. In this regard
incentives, rather than dis-incentives should be thought about. This is not only
because dis-incentives are more in the spirit of ‘forced’ rather than ‘voluntary’
but also because, in the absence of adequate political will and administrative
machinery to ensure their enforcement, they are really a non-issue. Incentives
could take the form of linking residential and non-residential relocation (to
sustain work residence relationships) and offering priority arrangements, in
allotment of residential, commercial and industrial developments in other parts
of the city, to inner city residents.
Such a city-wide framework would also allow room for accommodating
redevelopment interests of property owners in inner cities which can be a
major problem in cases like Bombay where a large proportion of property is
privately owned. In the Delhi case, this problem has not been made explicit in
any of the proposals as about half the properties are government owned. But it
is too easily forgotten that the other half are not. It was observed earlier that one
way of compromising redevelopment interests could be through compensation in
real estate terms elsewhere. For most development authorities, which use real
estate development as a source of capitalisation, this might appear somewhat
unacceptable. But it is important to appreciate that inner city problems,
particularly those pertaining to non-residential functions and to market factors,
are located in city wide considerations and their resolution has to be sought in
the same framework.

Prospective interventions for inner city planning

Policy issues for prospective planning that have a direct bearing on retrospective
interventions in inner city areas, in a sense, complete the framework for viewing
the inner city problem. A number of physical and fiscal planning issues would
fall in the purview of this area of policy issues. The following discussion,
however, is confined to two areas of physical planning: zoning practice and
general spatial planning.
In the last four decades of India’s town planning history, master plans of
nearly all small and large towns have adopted a system of zoning in preference
to the traditional system of mixed land use. Yet, mixing of non-residential
uses - unauthorised and often incompatible - persists in nearly all kinds of
housing areas. A serious problem pertaining to these unintended mixed land use
patterns is the city-wide disbalance in the extent and nature of mixing. Whereas
certain, usually high-income, housing areas have low levels of mixed land use,
others, especially low income and ‘informal’ ones, have extensively mixed land
uses often at the cost of the quality of their residential functioning. This is
particularly true for inner city areas where pre-existing non-residential uses,
130 Gira Dewan Verma

locational advantages, slack enforcement of regulations, etc., have made for

self perpetuating mixed land use patterns. It is important to mention in this
regard that city-wide mixed land use patterns are in response to city-wide user
compulsions. In low-income, non-formal housing areas, these compulsions are
easily satisfied. In other areas they may meet with direct or indirect resistance.
As a consequence, the former type of area comes to satisfy these compulsions
to an extent that is greater than their due share. Again, this is particularly so for
inner city areas.43 The important point in this regard is that as long as city-wide
household compulsions to engage in home/housing based economic activities are
not duly addressed in a city-wide framework, areas such as inner city areas will
continue to come under undue pressures of prolific mixed land use patterns. It
is beyond the scope of this article, and would be a digression from its main
theme, to go into a discussion of how viable integration of non-residential uses
in housing areas could come about. Suffice to say here that it would require
a change from specifying standards for provision to describing criteria for
permissibility based, not upon absolute performance/nuisance characteristics
of uses (as is done in conventional performance standard zoning practice)
but, upon such characteristics vis d vis the performance suitability/nuisance
acceptability of various locations within a layout and preferences of various
communities.44 City-wide integrated land use systems in place of conventional
zoning practice are crucial to alleviating the dis-balanced existing mixed land use
patterns which are a major part of the inner city problem.
A second area of prospective physical planning that merits discussion here
is one of general spatial planning of cities. Even as master plans throughout
the country advocate ‘poly-nodal’ spatial planning, most cities continue to
demonstrate mono-nuclear growth with all the problems for inner city areas
attendant to such growth patterns. There could be a number of reasons for
this gap between plan proposals and plan implementation and these could
possibly be categorised into inadequate planning and inadequate implementation.
Problems regarding inadequate implementation of sub-city centres are rooted
largely in resource constraints. This is indeed typical to Third World planning
interventions in general and an inevitable outcome of a situation in which the
earnestness of authorities to ‘provide’ rather than ‘facilitate’ and their under-
capitalisation are juxtaposed. One aspect of inadequate planning is that it does
not take into account this inevitability. Nearly all plans purporting poly-nodal
growth come up with static conceptual diagrams with city centres/sub-centres
neatly disposed in the city space. Such static conceptualisation makes for a
tendency to look upon each new centre as an independent entity on a ‘clean
slate’ so to speak. It is all too easily forgotten that various centres are also spaced
out in time and that one of the essential objectives of poly-nodal configurations
is to decongest from existing centres. This objective is seldom, if ever, made
explicit. It could be worthwhile, for instance, to link inner-city decongestion with
the development of new sub-city centres by, say, reserving a percentage of floor
space in the latter for the former. Together with allowing for city-wide mixed
land use patterns, this could substantially alleviate the inner city problem.
The foregoing is by no means an exhaustive discussion of prospective planning
issue for inner city renewal. It is intended primarily to demonstrate the need
for incorporating a temporal dimension in the wider framework for addressing
the inner city problem. This, in fact, should be the case for retrospective
interventions in general,

CONCLUDING REMARK

The precipitation and perpetuation of the problems of inner city areas are due
largely to the urban and economic growth of their wider city contexts. Their
 Inner City Renewal 131

persistence owes largely to the failure to view them from this perspective. Their
solutions, unless sought from this broader view, are likely to continue to remain
elusive. With this basic premise, the few explicit and implicit suggestions made in
this article, though they could afford some starting points, are intended primarily
to illustrate the range and scope of the framework required to address the inner
city problem. While the substantial problems attendant on rapid urbanisation
requiring urgent attention have long justified an approach of ‘something is
better than nothing’, India’s experience with inner city renewal equally clearly
demonstrates that the whole is, indeed, not quite the sum of the parts, and a
wider view of the inner city problem is long overdue. In this context, this article
may be seen as an attempt to delineate not so much the right answers as the
complete question.

NOTES
1. Government of India, Report of the Nafional Commission on Urbanisafion (New Delhi, India,
1988).
2. Some of these negative effects are: (a) often relatively affluent tenants find themselves in the
privileged position of paying rents far below their capacity, (b) rent control acts as a subsidy to
business and commercial establishments which manage to penetrate residential premises, (c) controls
generate extra-rental mechanisms, such as key-money, which are seldom directed towards increased
investment in the building, and (d) stabilisation of low-income groups in the inner city may be offset
by a condition of management stalemate in which the government, house-owners and residents all
decline responsibility for the housing stock (op. cit. 12, pp. 13-14).
3. The Master Plan for Delhi (1962) visualised the concept of urban renewal as: ‘*. to shape urban
structures so that all human activities may take place in an environment conducive to their proper
functioning and in harmony with other activities”. The urban renewal proposal spelt out is discussed
in the Delhi case.
4. UNCHS, Report of rhe Ad hoc, Expert Group Meeting on Human Settlements Management with Special
Reference lo Rehabilitation of Existing Housing Stock (New Dehli, February I-8), [UNCHS (Habitat),
Nairobi, 19823, p. 3.
5. Structural deterioration of housing stock. which in many cases has led to tragic house collapses, is
provoked by a combination of factors ranging from action of external agents, original construction
faults and inappropriate utilisation (op. cit. 4. p. 10). In the damp climate of Bombay, structural
collapse often results when structural timber members absorb moisture and warp, or when the webs
in rolled steel joists corrode or when the reinforcement in RCC work rusts. Also those sections
of walls often give way which carry storm water or drainage pipes that have become corroded and
susceptible to leakage. Ageing causes failure of flat arches and loss of strength in mortar besides
which several construction defects, especially inadequate reinforcement, may also exist. Most serious
damage, however seems to be man made, the underlying reason being the high occupancy and
consequent overloading of common parts. In particular, wet areas do not get a chance to dry and
are prone to structural cracks, party walls are often added with no regard to bearing capacity of the
structure, and there is practically no maintenance or routine repairs.
6. A total of 19,661 buildings in seven municipal wards of the island city were covered by the act
and cessed under its provisions, including all buildings erected prior to 1 September, 1940, and a
little over 3000 buildings erected later (op. cit., 13, p. 7). The act was subsequently replaced by the
Maharashtra Housing and Area Development (MHAD) Act and the functions and personnel of the
Bombay Repair and Reconstruction Board were inherited by the Building Repair and Reconstruction
Wing of the Bombay Housing and Area Development Board set up under the provisions of the
MHAD Act.
7. Bombay Housing and Area Development Board (BHADB), “Repair and reconstruction of old and
dilapidated buildings in the island city of Bombay”, undated internal document.
8. Some 12,009 buildings had been repaired up to 31 March, 1989, including 9043 cases of repairs by
the Board and 2966 cases of repairs under NOC (op. cit. 13, p. 10).
9. Op. cit. 7.
10. Some 252 buildings had been reconstructed up to 31 March, 1989. The statutory provision for
reconstruction by the beneficiaries under NOC seems to have few takers and final NOC had been
issued in only three cases (op. cif. 13, pp. 11, 29).
11. Op. cit. 7.
12. UNCHS, Rehabilitation of Inner Cify Areas: Feasible Sfraregies [UNCHS (Habitat), Nairobi, 1984).
13. A. Dua, Management of Bombay’s Housing Renewal Programme: a Critique, IHSP Report no. 27
(Human Settlements Management Institute, New Delhi, India, 1991).
14. The statutory annual contribution by the BMC and the state government was, to start with,
Rs 16 million each, and is presently Rs 36 million each, and the latter has also, of late, been
making over an ad hoc annual grant of Rs 50 million towards the programme (op. cit. 13. p. 7).
15. Up to August 1983, the cess recoverable from buildings constructed prior to September, 1940
before and after repairs was, respectively, 25% and 40% of the rateable value. The corresponding
figures for buildings constructed later and up to December, 1950, were 20% and 30%. and for those
constructed after December, 1950, 15% and 20%. These rates were revised upwards in August, 1983
 132 Gita Dewan Verma

and then again in January, 1987. Ten percent of the rateable value is the landlord’s and the rest the
occupier’s liability. The BMC collects the cess. keeps 5% to cover its expenses and makes the
rest over to the Board. At present around Rs 38 millions are recovered annually by way of cess
(op. cit. 13. p. 7). Cess arrears are high and by March 1989 amounted to Rs 258.4 million
(ibid., p. 24).
16. The rent (inclusive of capital cost recovery over a period of 80 years without any interest, municipal
taxes and repair and maintenance expenses) comes to Rs 116 for a 180 ft2 unit with an independent
toilet, Rs 98 for a 180 ftl unit with a shared toilet and Rs 64 for a 160 ft2 unit with common toilets. By
the end of March, 1989 the rent outstanding to the Board was Rs 28.2 million (op. cit. 13, p. 25).
17. For example. there are 16,OUO buildings that were constructed before 1940. Assuming an average
life of S&60 years for the timber frame structure that typifies them, most of these buildings are, or
will soon be, due for reconstruction. Further assuming 50 units per building, 16.72 rn’ per unit and
Rs 1200 per mz construction cost, an investment of more than Rs 16,000 million would be needed
for the reconstruction programme alone [J.B.D. d’souza, “Obsolescence in Bombay’s Housing Stock”,
paper for the ad-hoc expert group meeting (op. cit. 4), 19821. in the next 10 years, i.e., a required
investment of about Rs 1600 million per year. Against this, available funds (notes 14, 15) are about
Rs 160 million.
18. The walled city of Delhi accommodates a number of wholesale, retail, manufacturing, handicraft
and cottage industrial activities, besides major informal markets of the city. To give a rough idea
of the scale at which non-residential activities are proliferating, there are some 150,000 commercial
establishments (as against 22,000 in 1961 and 55,600 in 1971) and about 7000 industrial units. There
are nearly 88 ha of land under trade and commerce and 9.59 ha under industry, against 181.01 ha
under residential use (op. cit. 20, p. 44).
19. Delhi Development Authority (Perspective Planning Wing), “Walled City of Shahjehanabad: Planning
Issues and Policy Frame”, report for limited circulation (DDA, 1984).
20. Delhi Development Authority (Perspective Planning Wing), Proceedings of rhe Workshop on Some
CriticaL Issues: Delhi-2001 (DDA, 1986a), p, 44.
21. Op. cit. 19.
22. Town and Country Planning Organisation. Redevelopmenr of Shahjehanahad, the Walled city of Delhi:
a Resume of the Seminar held on January 31st and February Ist, 1975, at New Delhi (Ministry of
Works and Housing, Government of India, New Delhi, 1975), p. IX.
23. Ibid., p. 19.
24. The Slum Clearance and Rehousing Department (better known as the Slum Wing) was created
as a department in the Delhi Development (Provisional) Authority set up to replace the Delhi
Improvement Trust. In 1960 it was transferred to the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) and
has, since, shifted a few times between the MCD and the DDA. being at present with the latter.
25. The Ministry for Rehabilitation was set up after the country’s independence and its partition into
India and Pakistan to rehabilitate the refugees that came from Pakistan. and was made custodian
of properties left by those who fled to Pakistan.
26. One of the basic building blocks of the traditional urban form of the walled city of Delhi is the
karra, a one or two storeyed. multiple family dwelling around a central courtyarh. It is estimated
that there are some 7000 katra-tvue dwellings in Old Delhi. about half of them owned bv the Slum
Department. DDA (op. cit. 32). _’
27. Op. cit. 20, pp. 4546.
28. Op. cir. 22, p. 22.
29. Op. cit. 19.
30. Op. cit. 20.
31. Delhi Development Authority (Perspective Planning Wing), “Plan for the Redevelopment of the
Walled City of Shahjehanabad”, repoit for limited cir&latioi (DDA, 1986b).
32. M. Rai. P. Baross. E. Martinez and A.N. Krishnamurthv. Renewal of Historical Housing Stock in
Old Dklhi: Action-Oriented Research Project for the Renewal of Katrak. (IHSP-HSMI St&es no. 1
HSMI, New Delhi. 1988). p. 4.
33. Op. cit. 32.
34. The three types are: (i) fypical katras in which the original physical structure and layout of units is
largely intact and where “a positive attitude towards collective involvement in a renewal programme
was observed”; (ii) fragmented katras in which individual constructions and appropriation of common
spaces have drastically changed the original building configuration and where “social dynamics do
not aim beyond achieving individual tenure rights”, and (iii) dilapidared kafras comprising partially
collapsed buildings in which squatter households and sometimes shops and workshops have located
themselves and where occupiers show little interest in the renewal intentions of the government.
35. OD. cit. 19.
36. Ob. cir. 32, p. 43.
37. S.K. Das, “Revitalisation of inner city slums in Asian cities”, a draft working paper prepared for the
UNCHS group meeting on inner city slums (Bangkok. 1983).
38. G.D. Verma,’ “Integrated landuse systems for h&sing areas”. an unpublished thesis (Department of
Housing, School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi, India. 1987).
39. Op. cit. 4.
40. Op. cir. 37, p. 65.
41. op. Gil. 31.
42. Op. cif. 19.
43. Op. cir. 38.
44. G.D. Verma. ‘Shops in housing areas in Delhi’, in Archifecture f Design, Vol. VIII (1991).
No. 1.