Attractive incomes, ample employment opportunities and comparatively low living costs are driving interstate migrant populations to smaller cities that are emerging as counter-magnets to megalopolis. Analysis of various reports shows that smaller cities are rapidly growing, but at the same time struggling to cope with the infrastructure demands as civic revenue resources are on decline.

MNGREA effect

The Ministry of Rural Development told the Rajya Sabha in February 2019 that the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) had not conducted a survey on migration during 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2017-18. The Ministry has no fresh data on migration, but it claimed that the government was implementing various schemes to provide basic needs and develop rural infrastructure for improving living conditions of rural masses so that distress migration of people from rural areas to cities could be reduced.

In a market economy like India, the movement of people for better economic opportunities is inexorable, said the government. It, however, claimed that Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme succeeded in reducing such migration.

Unabated migration

However, the analysis of different reports shows that interstate migration is multiplying and migrants prefer smaller cities to settled down. ‘Migration and its impacts on cities,’ a report by the World Economic Forum, cites the example of Pune, which has become a counter-magnet to Mumbai.

“The high cost of living and overcrowding in Mumbai has drawn migrants to Pune in search of better opportunities in all areas of life. It is now a preferred destination for many citizens in Maharashtra for job opportunities, education, healthcare services, real estate investment and better quality of life, among others, given that Mumbai is already crowded with a comparatively higher cost of living. The same applies to many citizens all over India, who migrate to the city for better jobs and education,” the report said.

But it is not just Pune acting as counter-magnet to Mumbai. “There is an interesting dynamic between Gujarat and Maharashtra, where Surat has started acting as a counter-magnet region to Mumbai and attracts migrants from the neighbouring districts of Maharashtra. Other counter-magnet region dynamics are observed in Jaipur and Chandigarh (to Delhi),” the Economic Survey -2016-17 had noted.

Urban agglomeration

Cities, including Surat, Faridabad and Ludhiana total over 55 per cent of in-migrants while Jaipur is growing as the urban agglomeration with migration spreading to the suburbs.

According to the 2011 Census, population of Class I cities (more than 1 lakh population) is on the rise. In 2001, the total number of Class I cities was 441, which constituted 62.29 per cent of the total urban population, while in 2011, the number of Class I cities increased to 468, constituting 70.24 per cent of total urban population. Not surprisingly, the share of the workforce engaged in the agriculture sector (cultivators and labourers) came down from 58.2 per cent in 2001 to 54.6 per cent in 2011.

Resource crunch

However, municipal bodies in smaller cities are facing a daunting challenge to accommodate the rising population because of inadequate revenue resources. The total revenues of the municipal sector accounts for only 0.75 per cent of the country’s GDP as against 6 per cent for South Africa, 5 per cent for Brazil and 4.5 per cent for Poland.

According to the economist and planning expert Isher Judge Ahluwalia, there is still inadequate understanding of the need to plan for urbanisation and to translate the plans into action so that Indian cities can provide a better quality of life to their residents and develop a better investment climate to attract entrepreneurs and innovators.