The City – ‘Nanded’

The city being a significant holy place, for followers of the Sikh faith, it is a sacred site and has the
well-known Hazur Sahib Gurudwara. Every year, tourists from all over the world, mostly Sikhs, visit
Gurudwara. The Gur ta Gaddi Tercentenary Celebrations in 2008, commemorating the 300th
anniversary of Sikhism's holy events, led to concomitant financing assistance from governments.
Which allowed preserving and highlighting its natural socio-cultural strengths, and guaranteed
overall development associated with transforming the city into an economic hub. As a result, since
2006, a slew of infrastructure development projects has begun for the vision of 2025.

The City spent the two years leading up to the event focusing on infrastructure upgrades, including
an airport, a railway station, roads, bridges, and flyovers, as well as constructing multiple temporary
shelters and tents for devotees. The city's development has accelerated as a result of this
occurrence. The transformation focuses on long-term economic growth, encouraging health,
education, tourism, local job possibilities, affordable housing, and essential urban services for the
urban poor, as well as well-planned infrastructure. The City Municipal Corporation has attempted to
handle Basic Services for Urban Poor through in-situ slum redevelopment rather than evictions and
resettlement. In Nanded, the housing supply market is dominated by the private sector, with just a
few public initiatives.

An encroachment around the Godavari riverbed is being considered, people are either shifted or
expected to move as development takes place. People have been relocated from various
government lands, such as railway land and airport land, to accommodate various development
projects, such as bridge construction, road widening, and airport expansion. Residents include
labour in a variety of jobs, including vegetable vending, construction, welding, and various types of
daily wage employment. Residents at the relocation sites face a problem such as high electricity bills,
dwelling units illegally sold, hygiene and sanitation, water, drainage. As the relocation takes place
people have to pay for the commute to reach their workplace and they can't access to work as
readily as they could prior to the relocation. Due to the lack of public transportation in the area,
some of them now have to pay greater transportation charges to get to work

Nanded is one of the most prominent regional education centres in the Marathwada area, with
several excellent educational institutions. There are institutions that cater to students studying
Engineering, Medicine, Law, Management, and Agriculture Sciences, among other fields. The city
now boasts a huge number of students studying at these colleges who come from adjacent cities. As
a result, there’s a continuous increase in the urban population, also an increase in demand for
housing from residents of nearby villages and towns. People are migrating from rural to urban areas
as cities become more urbanized.

However, given the current economic and political scenario, the expansion of urban infrastructure is
delayed. Many sectors of the city's development have come to a halt corresponding to less
investment in infrastructure. Infrastructure development has not kept pace with population
increase, resulting in a level of development imbalance.