Can Mumbai Become India's Shanghai? Not So Fast
Siliconeer , News Feature, Siddharth Srivastava, Posted: Apr 17, 2005
One big difference the way China and India is developing is the encumbrance of politics that becomes inevitable in a vibrant democracy like India. The most recent casualty: the Mumbai-Shanghai plan. This is an ambitious bid to convert India’s commercial capital into an approximation of Shanghai as India scrambles to catch up with its giant Asian neighbor’s torrid economic progress.
However, what’s a piece of cake in China is anything but that in India. The plan has stuttered even before it has begun — exigencies of power and vote bank politics have thrown a spanner in the works.
In any case, Mumbai is anything but an approximation of today’s Shanghai. Pollution, encroachments, traffic congestion, unplanned urbanization have taken its toll, made worse by the sea of slum dwellers who have been coddled by political parties of every hue because they are a rich source of votes.
The rows and rows of slums that adjoin Mumbai airport are not a palatable first glimpse of the city that greets the international traveler as the plane lands. On the other hand, Pu Dong airport in Shanghai is state-of-the-art: the Maglev — magnetic levitation — train is the fastest rail system in the world, whisking passengers in Shanghai within minutes across what would be a two-hour ride for similar distances in Mumbai. If you are lucky, that is. If you aren’t (which is often), then you will get caught in a traffic jam, and even Ganpati cannot tell when you will get to your destination.
No matter. The Maharashtra government and corporate houses including McKinsey have studied the feasibility of modernizing Mumbai with Shanghai as the model. The studies have revealed that n additional annual investment of $5 billion will be needed till the year 2013 to turn Mumbai into a world-class city.
The Shanghai-Mumbai bugle was first sounded by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in October last year. “When we talk of a resurgent Asia, people think of the great changes that have come about in Shanghai. I share the aspiration to transform Mumbai in the next five years in such a manner that people would forget about Shanghai and Mumbai will become a talking point,” the prime minister said.
After a Congress-led government came to power, the Maharashtra government unveiled a $6.5 billion plan to rebuild Mumbai into an international city like Shanghai.
Delhi offered $2 billion over the next five years for turning the city around. Transformation plans included the Mumbai-metro rail link, the trans-harbor project, the ring railway plan and Wadala truck terminus project, removal of encroachments, beautification of the international airport at Mumbai, the Mumbai-urban infrastructural development and the upgradation of King Edward Memorial Hospital.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh spearheaded the Mumbai-into-Shanghai plan, seeking even more New Delhi largesse.
Slum demolitions have followed, leaving over 200,000 people displaced as the government tried to free up prime real estate for development. According to reports, over 50,000 shanties have been demolished in a few weeks as the administration bulldozed 200 acres of illegally occupied government land, and that was just for starters. Slums built after 1995, located in prime locations, were to be demolished with the inhabitants transferred to government provided housing outside the city area. This step was also in agreement with a government statute in 2002 that made slum construction post-1995 a cognizable offense.
That’s when the big arm of politics — read exigencies of retaining vote banks — caught up with Deshmukh. In a clear reminder that development and governance can often be at loggerheads with politics, Congress party president Sonia Gandhi summoned Deshmukh to Delhi for a dressing down. The final word was that slum demolitions were contrary to the Congress party’s pro-poor image. Now the cut-off date for slum demolition has been revised to 2000, which pretty much retains the status quo in the overpopulated and congested metropolis.
A much-subdued Deshmukh said his government would focus on the human side of development while carrying out all-round development of the city to improve the quality of life; he said the action program would include rehabilitation of residents in slums which have come up before 2000.
That’s not all. In the budget unveiled for the next financial year, the much-hyped national urban renewal mission, aimed at changing the look of seven mega-cities and 28 cities, will be getting all of $1.1 billion, a far cry from the $30 billion earlier touted. The three Mumbai projects mentioned by Finance Minister P. Chidambaram in his budget speech — metro rail, the trans-harbor link and western freeway sea link — each requires more than the entire allocation for completion.
While it is true that any development should incorporate a human face, hard decisions sometimes need to be taken. It is perhaps a pitfall as well as a blessing of democracy that the voice of the common man has to be incorporated before hard economic decisions based on data and statistics are taken. According to The Hindustan Times: “Clearing a city (Mumbai) of slums is about economics. Shantytowns are choking Mumbai’s infrastructure development. But it is also about politics. People lose homes and they have votes. The way to take care of the politics is to offer, as it were, a concrete proof of the government’s commitment to those affected by demolition…Mr Deshmukh was brave to start the drive. He will be braver if he can start off, again, differently.’’
Perhaps the prime minister’s dream to turn Mumbai into Shanghai will happen, but not at Shanghai’s blistering pace. Democracy often means taking the staircase to economic success, not the elevator, as in China. Hopefully, the sacrifice is worth it. It’s almost certainly is more humane.
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