It is no exaggeration to say that the best of development lies in the shift of population to the urban areas. Any country’s economic development will have a close link with its rate of urbanisation. The economic stagnation in India during the beginning of the twentieth century had contained her urbanisation. But the new century has set the pace of urbanisation in almost all parts of the country.
One cannot deny that urbanisation is a recent development. All cities cannot be called urban areas. Our census projects that the place which has either a municipality, a corporation or a cantonment or a notified town area is an urban place.
The places which have well settled population of five thousand or more, where the density of population is at least 400 per sq. km., where three quarters of its male population engaged in vocations other than agriculture are also called urban areas.
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In Europe and North America, urbanisation was the direct consequence of industrialisation. In India industrialisation started very late and so comparatively urbanisation is also a later phenomenon. In India, till we gained independence, urbanisation was not so rapid. Hardly twenty per cent of the country’s population were settled in cities. The figures rose later on.
Even now the urban population of India is not more than thirty per cent of the total population of the country. In all other countries the urban population is comparatively higher.
It is learnt that nearly 95 per cent of the population in the United States is urban. The United Kingdom has 80 per cent of its total population in urban areas, Japan has nearly 70 per cent of its population in urban settlements, and Russia has nearly 60 per cent of its population is settled in urban areas.
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There are so many factors that lead to migration of rural population to urban centers. The rustic generally come to urban places in order to find work and employment. The seasonal nature of agricultural operation offers less employment opportunities to the peasants. Thus, jobless agricultural workers throng the cities with hopes that these industrialised urban areas will provide them better employment opportunities.
It is true to some extent that the lure of comforts of life drags the innocent villagers to urban centers. The glamour and luxury found in the cities tempt the innocent and ignorant rural folk to migrate to these places.
Unemployment, insufficient income, family disputes, communal tensions, debts and insolvency are the push factors. The growth of new business, better opportunities of employment, better educational facilities, better medical facilities, and availability of cultural and social amenities are the pull factors.
In the pre-industrial cities the pattern of urbanisation and the population seemed to concentrate in or around the centre of the city. Here most of the facilities were available. That is why the cities were not big in size. Unlike the modern well planned towns, the towns in ancient India did not have separate residential localities each having its own shopping centre and other facilities.
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Entire business was concentrated within the bazaars, and the distribution of population was on community lines. With the colonial settlement of Europeans in India, new pattern of urbanisation was introduced. They built administrative offices and residential areas outside the old cities and planned the new towns in a manner that there should be no congestion. Pattern of segregation was also introduced by them; they started having separate colonies for officers and workers according to their official position and status.
The social consequences of urbanisation are many. It creates the problem of housing. Labour disputes and the pressure on the schools are the other direct consequences of this. They start following a different pattern of life. In the cities there is physical proximity but social distance. The hostel life has a great attraction for the younger generation. The urban slums are expanding beyond proportions. Economic hardships and poverty bring conflicts among different groups.
The urbanisation has resulted in overcrowded houses, bottle necks on roads and many other problems. The great effect of urbanisation is on individual family and environment. There is a lack of social feeling. On the social level contact in urban cities have become secondary and segmental. Persons have become self seeking. This type of unchecked flow in the towns has prevented the rise of wage level and has worsened the conditions in the towns.
Urbanisation has brought a transition from the type of family we used to have in the past. Nowadays people have adopted the style of living in nuclear families. Even the function of the family is undergoing changes and mutual relations in the family are affected.
Urbanisation has its effects on environments also. Inadequate housing, water supply, sewage, insufficient facilities of recreation are the other consequences of urbanisation. The effect of urbanisation is also significant on the villages. Some villages show tendency towards integration with the cities. Community life is disappearing in nearby villages because the bigger cities absorb these villages.
No doubt there are wide variations with regard to the extent of urbanisation and these depicted in the different States of India. Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat and West Bengal have a high degree of urbanisation, because a number of public sector projects of national importance have come up in these states. Moreover in these States we have port cities that are conducive for our overseas trade.
It will not be incorrect to say that industrialisation does not seem to increase urbanisation in India. There has been simultaneous growth of agricultural and non- agricultural workers. Urbanisation in India is growing constantly and it is becoming more and more important.