Blogs

India witnessed a vast exodus of informal sector workers in the last few months. This has opened a can of worms questioning the role of these workers in India’s growth story. Urban India depends largely on the informal rural workforce that migrates to cities in search of livelihood and helps build these ever-expanding cities. While the informal workforce contributes significantly to creating and building our cities, there work continues to be undocumented. The situation exploded particularly badly when, in March India instituted a highly controlling lockdown and subsequently...

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated societal and economic challenges. Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in India have been particularly hit by the pandemic, subsequent lockdown and exodus of migrant workers that followed the lockdown. While the economy is slowly opening, a key concern for MSMEs is that they may not be able to operate at full capacities. On the occasion of the 2nd edition of International Micro-, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Day, we must find ways to unlock their potential to achieve the...

Responding to rapid urbanization and growing congestion, several Indian cities have invested in metro rail networks to provide sustainable and affordable mass transit that can cater to large volumes of people. However, a majority of metro systems have not been able to reach their projected ridership. This shortfall has been attributed to a lack of comprehensive first-and last-mile solutions to connect homes, offices, and other activity centers with metro stations. In 2016, 70% of potential Bangalore Metro users cited poor first- and last-mile connectivity as a reason for not using it,...

The ongoing pandemic has wreaked immense and lasting damage to India’s economy, and passenger transport has been particularly affected. Its far-reaching impact on the aviation and railway industry is well-documented, along with the struggles of...

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is the defining global health crisis of our times and is proving to be one of the greatest challenges faced by humanity. It is wreaking havoc around the globe and has forced most of human work to shut down. However, these uncertain times have inadvertently helped the environment, with frequent sightings of...

Access to electricity ensures increased economic productivity, healthcare services and better educational prospects and is thus crucial for socio-economic development. While grid expansion and advances in the distributed Renewable Energy (RE) industry have made significant efforts to reach unserved and under-served populations, several livelihoods, healthcare and educational facilities still lack this vital resource.

Caught in a vicious cycle of under-development, a potent tool for the rural and remote populations to break out of cyclical poverty is access to electricity. Low...

By investing in cycling infrastructure now, the city with one of the most severe traffic congestions in the world, can recover from the lockdown more sustainably and build more resilience.

The number of COVID-19 cases in Bengaluru could have been at par with other major Indian cities, but quick and decisive actions by the government have helped stem that risk. As the city crawls back to normalcy and people look at safer mobility options, Bengaluru now faces the...

This blog was originally published on WRI.

The axiom for this anxious moment is: coronavirus makes everything more complicated. That has been the case in Bangladesh and eastern India in the season’s first tropical cyclone, Amphan, where high winds and lashing rain threatened the region’s most vulnerable populations. Decades of preparation, plus a weakening of the storm as it made landfall, appear to have mitigated Amphan’s initial impact: the...

Even as global health experts raise concerns over the risks faced by rural areas during the COVID-19 pandemic, and highlight the need for a comprehensive approach by governments to tackle it, a hospital for marginalized communities in remote Jharkhand is leading the way in crisis-preparedness. The Nav Jivan Hospital in Palamu district, a 100-bed medical facility, is today on the frontline of rural India’s fight against COVID-19.

Established in 1961 to serve two of the most under-...

A slightly modified version of this piece appeared on Times blog on May 11.

Social distancing, isolation and locking down of cities and oneself is the norm in times of the COVID-19 pandemic. With this, inequality in cities has been laid bare, exposing the startling vulnerability of the urban poor. The current economic slowdown is being...