In India, nearly 350 million i.e. one-third of
population lives in cities and towns. People have
been increasingly taking up non agriculture work
and living in cities and towns: This process is
called urbanisation. A considerable section of
population in the 1950s lived in 5.6 lakh villages
and there were only 5 cities that had a population
of more than 1 million each and the number of
cities with 1 lakh population was around 40. Today,
the number of villages has increased to 6.4 lakhs
and about 850 million people live in these villages.
Three cities – Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata - accommodate
more than 10 million people each. There are more than
50 cities that have a population of 1 million and above.

Though there has been an increase in urbanisation, the necessity of providing
basic infrastructure that can support this growth is missing. You require roads,
drainage, electricity, water and other public facilities. Government intervention
is making some headway in improving the urban infrastructure particularly those
health infrastructure is not sufficient. For poorer people in the cities and
towns, this situation is even worse.

How does urban India contribute to India’s economic development? Service
sector activities such as finance, insurance, real estate and business related
service activities such as transport, storage and communication contribute more than
industrial activities. There is no major growth of industrial output over
the last few decades.

Living in or moving into cities and towns is a boon only for a few. Although
the level of poverty in urban areas is relatively lower than what is noticed
in rural areas,there is a huge gap between the average income of a low income
family and a high income family. This gap has also been increasing in cities
and towns. Incomes earned in urban areas by the SC/ STs are far lower than other
caste groups. In 2009-10, only about one-sixth of urbanites belonging to
castes other than SC/ STs were poor whereas in the case of SC/ ST urbanites the
poverty level is double. Most of these poor live in non metropolitan towns and
work in the unorganised sector.Most of the population increase in cities and
towns took place as a consequence of natural growth within the urban areas.
The population of these urban areas increased over time. Some of the growth in
urban settlements took place by expansion, with the inclusion of rural areas
surrounding older cities and towns.Only one-fifth of the growth is due to
rural - to - urban migration