New urban in Bihar

Abstract

The government of Bihar has approved to form of 95 Nagar panchayats, 40 Parishads and 7 municipal corporations in December 2020 as per the proposal made by Bihar Urban Development and Housing department. This is a change that is going to affect Bihar which has a predominantly agrarian population. The transformation will alter the demography of at least 194 gram panchayats and add an urban population of 2.1 million just by new towns. The urbanization rate of Bihar is very low around 11.3% in comparison to the national average of 31.2%. Therefore, the state government mentions that this step will help in increasing the urbanization rate of the Bihar by adding more areas under urban development through reclassification of the local bodies. The urban area in India is defined by two processes. The first one is by giving the functional status which is called the census towns and the second is by giving the administrative status which is called statutory towns. Census towns are classified based on three pre-defined criteria of population, density, percentage of male main working population engaged in non-agricultural activities. The census towns may or may not be given the official urban status by the state government and thus may remain to be governed by the gram panchayat. The statutory towns are defined by the state government even if they do not qualify for census town criteria. Each state has its own Municipal Acts which is used are define these towns. The political pull also plays a huge role in demarcating such towns. Higher policy engagement at the urban level is also one of the reasons for the State government to form new towns to make more settlements eligible to attract funds for urban development. There are several other factors as suggested by the literature which are responsible for urbanization. In the case of Bihar, out of 95 new Nagar Panchayats, there are only 11 census towns which officially turned urban. The formation of the other 84 Nagar panchayats remains unjustified. The study focuses on exploring the motivation behind the urbanization taking place in Bihar and check for any hidden agenda. A Nagar Panchayat from Gaya district has been selected as the study area as it is the district that has high development along with maximum transformation from rural to urban. The idea is to cross-check the eligibility of the settlement to be called urban not just focusing on physical parameters but also the socio-economic parameters. Finally, suggest recommendations for Bihar State Urban Policy for defining norms for urban-rural classification based on thegaps identified from the analysis. The study will contribute to reinterpreting definitions of urban-rural classifications.