Economic Impact of Urbanisation in the Post Liberalization ERA – A Case Study of Villages in OMR, Chennai

INTRODUCTION

Urbanization can be seen as a specific condition at a set time (e.g. the proportion of total population to the area in cities or towns) or as an increase in that condition over time. Urbanization can be quantified either in terms of the level of urban development relative to the overall population, or as the rate at which the urban proportion of the population is increasing. Urbanization is not merely a modern phenomenon, but also a rapid and historic transformation of human social roots on a global scale, whereby predominantly rural culture is being rapidly replaced by predominantly urban culture. The first major change in settlement patterns was the accumulation of hunter-gatherers into villages many thousand years ago. Village culture is characterized by common bloodlines, intimate relationships, and communal behaviour whereas urban culture is characterized by distant bloodlines, unfamiliar relations, and competitive behaviour. This unprecedented movement of people is likely to continue and intensify in the next few decades, inflating cities to sizes unthinkable only a century ago. Today, in Asia, the urban agglomerations of Dhaka, Karachi, Jakarta, Mumbai, Delhi, Manila, Seoul and Beijing are each already home to over 20 million people, while the Pearl River Delta, Shanghai-Suzhou and Tokyo are forecast to approach or exceed 40 million people each, within the next decade. Outside Asia, Mexico City, Sao Paulo, New York City, Lagos and Cairo are fast approaching being, or are already, home to over 20 million people.

In physical terms, urban centres are the habitats of large populations, with distinctive economic strength, life style, livelihood, organization, land use and institutions. Therefore, development of urban centres requires a proper planning. In India, urban centres are generally governed by different urban local bodies, but in order to maintain the urban infrastructure and services a huge amount of resources are required. After the 74th amendment of the Indian Constitution, three levels of government, namely, Union Government, State Government and Local Government have to cooperate, to fulfil the financial requirements of urban centres. While the Union Government enacts the policy statements and Acts, the State Government has to provide the necessary legal and financial base for the municipalities and city corporations, the actual work is undertaken by the municipalities and city corporations themselves. Several studies have shown that there is absence of firm data on municipal revenue and expenditure in India. However, it is assumed that per capita expenditure is relatively low. The present research is an attempt to judge urban development, through the concept of urban quality of life by analysing the availability and accessibility of basic needs such as health, education, housing and household amenities, transport and communication. Again, under these heads, several sets of indicators have been chosen,

• To examine critically the role played by the municipalities and local bodies in the urban development in the study area. • To trace the spatial and temporal trends in the pattern of urbanisation in the study area. • To analyse the distributional aspects of the services and amenities availed by the different population groups and localities. • To analyse the levels of disparity in physical and social infrastructure and basic amenities in terms of their progress and quality in the study area. • To study the economic impact of urbanisation in the study area.

Research methodology is the science of studying how research is done scientifically. It is a way to systematically solve the research problem by logically adopting various steps. Methodology helps to understand not only the product of scientific inquiry but also the process itself. Research material has been extracted from both primary and secondary sources. The study focuses at micro level and primary source of information i.e. Household survey data have been analysed. Nevertheless, secondary sources have also been analysed at a macro level for comprehending the overall urban development of Chennai City, with special reference to OMR. Descriptive researches were adopted.

The present study was based on both primary and secondary data. The town or city level information was used mainly for the purpose of comparative study of the towns or cities of Tamil Nadu. The study incorporates Chennai OMR as a distinct urban geographical unit. Data at city and ward level on various social, demographic, economic and physical environments were collected form secondary sources. Municipal level study was done to capture the internal variations in the level of development of physical and social infrastructure in OMR.

Descriptive research includes survey and fact finding enquiries of different kinds, it also includes the attempts by Researcher to discover because even when the researcher controls the variable. The methods utilized in descriptive research are survey

The data were collected from 150 residents of OMR based on a questionnaire prepared for this purpose. Direct contact helped to collect data as well as to get a feel of how things work in the area. The questionnaire was so designed that the data collected can be analyzed and inference can be drawn. For the tabulation purpose, the percentage method was used. The tabulation used the bar graph, which gives an easier knowledge of analysis.

Sampling Method was used in the selected areas of OMR such as Semmancheri, Sholinganallur and Karapakkam.

Out of the population 150 households were identified determined as the sample size for the study.

A questionnaire was prepared especially for this purpose of study.

India is the world's fifth-largest producer of global warming gas and emissions (USA leads the race). The problem of pollution is more severe in big cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Chennai. In India, urban areas are more developed and industrialized than the rural areas, and this attracts more people to the urban areas. Thus there is more pressure on facilities like transport services, housing and drainage facilities, as well as more production of other goods required by the urban population, which in turn results in the release of large amounts of wastes and pollutants. The growing pollution levels in India form the subject matter of this case let. The threatening pollution levels in the urban areas and the reasons for the inability to control pollution in the country are discussed. The case let also examines the measures being taken by the Indian Government to counter the growing pollution levels. There is increase in population in cities and towns rather than in rural areas. Urbanization began during the industrial revolution, when workers moved towards manufacturing hubs in cities, to obtain jobs in factories, as agricultural jobs became less common. Larsen (2010) in his paper presented the challenge of the creative economy for practice and research. It seeks to do so by comparing developments in with developments in the related discipline of urban

has meant a close connection between corporate and urban development. This means that FM, in order to facilitate creative environments, can find inspiration from trends in urban planning, and look at the urban context as a part of its facilities. However, including the urban context in FM, and studying it, comes with possibilities as well as challenges. Needs what is called a thematic as well as epistemological ―urbanisation‖ in order to recognise creative and social possibilities and needs. Whereas the research is thoroughly founded in urban and social theory and sketches out important considerations in establishing an urbanised research agenda for it does not include all recent developments within subjects such as new ways of working, place design and management

From the table - 1 it is clearly inferred that 1.3% of the respondents were aged below 25years, 4% respondents were aged between 25-30 years, 17.33% respondents were aged between 30-35 years, 29 % respondents were aged between 35-40 years, and 47% of the respondents were aged above 40 years.

26.66% respondents owned less than one acre, 37.33% of the respondents owned one to two acre and 25.33% of respondents owned more than two acres of land.

The table 3 indicates that 66.66% of respondents reported in favour of extension of services, 25.33 favoured basic services extension, 5.3% supported income generating activities, and 2.66% of respondents wanted all of them for development.

According to table 4 believed that development brings change 41.33% of the respondents, 33.33% of the respondent disagreed with this statement, 2.66% of the respondents strongly disagreed with the statement, and 22.66% of the respondents strongly agreed with the statement.

hypothesis was rejected and the alternative hypothesis was accepted. Hence it can be concluded that, there was a significant relationship between age and activities of political parties

HO= There is no significant relationship between educational qualification and progress of the district (null hypothesis) H1= There is a significant relationship between educational qualification and progress of the district (alternative hypothesis)

It is evident from table 7 that weighted average beings four, respondents viewed that modernisation was the important benefit of urbanisation and development

Tamil Nadu has to be projected as an important industrial and commercial hub of the nation and the municipalities in Tamil Nadu, particularly small and medium size towns are economically challenged. Urban local bodies are becoming increasingly dependent on government grants for their operation and maintenance requirements. The only way to improve is to promote the growth of rail, bus, truck and car traffic, development of airport, road facility, railways improvement and discharges migration of people from rural to urban centre. Hence there is need for complete transformation of the urban management structure and practices and massive programmes for resource mobilisation through innovative financial planning. It is therefore a huge challenge for cope up with these tasks. First of all should take the responsibility of ensuring certain minimum level of amenities for all sections of the city irrespective of the location factor. Once the minimum services are achieved, the municipal authority would be free to offer additional or improved services on commercial principles. If specific high demand areas are identified, as in housing estates, it is possible to license private operators to offer differential services

To sum up, it can be said that in Chennai and particularly in OMR, the issues of infrastructure, education, health, environment and more importantly sanitation have to be addressed in a holistic manner. Demand for infrastructure and services are likely to grow more rapidly in the near future as the urban centres are gaining more and more pivotal role in economic development. Several studies have shown that by the year 2030, more than fifty percent of developing country's population will be residing in the urban centres. This appears to be true for Tamil Nadu as well because their urban centres which are gaining higher growth. Thus there will be a major deficiency in the provision of urban infrastructure and services in the towns of Tamil Nadu. In other words, with an increase in urbanisation, the existing infrastructure of the cities and towns would tend to get overused causing stress in urban lifestyle and environment. The problems are not only of the shortage of services in urban Tamil Nadu but also inequitable distribution of services among the different size class towns as well as the different sections of society.

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Ph.D. Full Time, Research Scholar, Department of History, Bharathidasan University, Tiruchirappalli, Tamilnadu