About the Book

India’s urbanization differs markedly from that of the more developed regions. While urban growth in the more developed regions is slowing down, India’s urbanization is moving with a speedy pace.  India has been facing a serious problem of the rapid rise of population since the last seven decades. The huge size of urban population has reached nearly 400 million now, while until the nineteenth century no developed country had a population of more than 100 million.

Only a few metropolises dominate the remainder of the country so excessively that they prevent other parts from developing, causing increasing regional imbalance. The rapidly increasing population requires a commensurate increase in the number of jobs in urban areas, if this population is not to starve or be reduced to total dependence. The expansion in the industrial sector of the economy has lagged far behind the population growth. This has resulted in increasing unemployment, slums, deterioration in urban living, crime, political tension, poverty and similar other problems. It appears that India is likely to confront still greater urban problems in future. With the hasty rise of population, the quality of life in big cities has deteriorated quite significantly.

Covering multifaceted dimensions of urban growth, the book offers fresh debates on India’s urbanization. It will be useful for researchers, students, urban planners and policymakers, interested in urban studies.

Contents

1.             Introduction to Urbanization in India

2.            Urbanization and Urban Growth: A Global Overview

3.            Urbanization in India: Concepts and Theories

4.            Urbanization in India, 1901–1971

5.            Urbanization in Independent India

6.            Urban India: A Socio-economic Profile

7.            Challenges of Urbanization and Environmental Degradation

About the Author / Editor

J.P. Singh, author and lexicographer, holds a PhD in Demography from the Australian National University, Canberra. He had advance training in population and economics at the ISS, Hague (the Netherlands) and attended Summer Training Program at Institute of Population, East-West Center of University of Hawaii (USA). He has worked as Professor of Sociology, Additional Director of Population Research Centre and Pro Vice-Chancellor of Patna University, Patna. He has also worked as Director (Higher Education), Government of Bihar. He has published more than 100 research papers and book reviews in professional journals from India and abroad and set a record of publishing 40 books in the field of demography, anthropology, sociology and Indology during four decades of his academic career.