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Govt ready to spend more on ‘trishanku towns’
Vibha Sharma/TNS

New Delhi, June 5
The government has finally woken up to the needs of fast increasing “census towns” with the Planning Commission allocating Rs 1,500 crore (subject to final approval) in the 12th Plan for infrastructure development in 50 or 60 urbanised villages across the country.

The Ministry of Rural Development has invited “expression of interest” from private parties to build infrastructure in nine such “trishanku towns”, as minister Jairam Ramesh prefers to call these semi-rural semi-urban towns that otherwise go by the name, “census towns”.

Interestingly, even though their number has tripled from 1,362 in 2001 to 3,894 in 2011, the government still does not have any dedicated policy to take care of the needs of these areas such as water supply, sanitation and infrastructure. Therefore, even though their population has increased to qualify them as “census towns”, amenities there have remained that of the village level.

Six states that have seen the maximum increase of such “trishanku towns” are West Bengal (250 in 2001 to 780 in 2011), Kerala (99 to 461), Uttar Pradesh (66 to 267), Maharashtra (127 to 279), Andhra Pradesh (93 to 228) and Tamil Nadu (111 to 376).

With a large migration of population to rural areas adjoining cities, Punjab has also sen a five-fold increase in their number in the past 10 years, from 18 in 2001 to 74 in 2011. In Haryana these have increased from 22 to 74, Chandigarh zero to five and Delhi 59 to 110.

Now, the reason for this neglect so far is quite interesting.

According to Ramesh, most of the government policies are either meant for urban or rural areas. It means that even though the numbers of “census towns” grew by leaps and bounds, in fact, almost equalling the number of statutory towns (4041) in the country in the past 10 years, the government forgot to design new policies to take care of these new emerging areas.

While its earlier attempt to develop these areas through Provision of Urban Amenities in Rural Areas (PURA) failed because of resentment shown by the states to Central interference in their matters, the government hopes that the new improved PURA 2.0 would find more acceptance.

All the schemes for the provision of urban amenities and livelihood opportunities in rural areas will be implemented through public-private partnership between gram panchayats and the private sector.

The states will be allowed to have an equal say in picking up the private party for building the infrastructure but it is yet to be seen how states such as West Bengal would react to private companies involved in income- generating activities through infrastructure building.

Why the neglect

Union Minister Jairam Ramesh prefers to call these semi-rural semi-urban towns “trishanku towns”. Ramesh says most of the government policies are either meant for urban or rural areas. It means that even though the numbers of such towns grew by leaps and bounds the government forgot to frame new policies to take care of these emerging areas