Over the past decade, policy and programming commitments in India have investigated how to improve the lives of the urban poor. In 2005, the Basic Services for the Urban Poor (BSUP) component of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) was launched, eventually covering 67 cities.
 
BSUP was introduced in response to the growing need in India, where the urban population increased from 286 million in 2001 to 377 million in 2011. Between 18 and 25 percent of the urban population now live in informal settlements without basic amenities; there is a shortfall of 18.78 million dwelling units (DUs), 95 percent of which are required for people on low incomes.
 
This policy brief draws on findings from BSUP as well as a wider set of primary and secondary research. Researchers from the Effective States and Inclusive Development Research Centre at the University of  Manchester (UK) studied five cities where BSUP has been implemented: Bhubaneswar, Bhopal, Pune, Patna and Visakhapatnam. These cities were selected for their geographical spread and varying levels of urbanisation.
 
Key findings:
  • India’s Basic Services for the Urban Poor programme has failed to address urban poverty, due to shortcomings in design, such as: insufficient attention to tenure; lack of emphasis on the universalisation of basic services; low levels of participation by the urban poor; and unaffordability
  • disproportionately low funding has limited the programme’s scale and led to poor performance. A very small proportion of slum households are covered, and thousands of built dwelling units remain unoccupied
  • planning documents are of poor quality and often prepared without consulting the urban poor, as there are no institutional mechanisms for community participation
  • there is low satisfaction among beneficiaries, due to: high costs; inconvenient sites for relocation; poor quality and design of construction; and a lack of provision for operation and maintenance
  • there are exceptions to these findings: there was community participation in Bhubaneswar and Pune (though it was institutionalised only in Pune); and progress and delivery of the projects was better in Pune and Visakhapatnam, due to higher capacity of municipal officials

May 31, 2016May 31, 20160
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