Pune, Kolkata Tops the Janaagraha’s Governance Survey List, Bengaluru, Chandigarh & Dehradun are Bottom 3 Cities
The survey edition covered 23 major cities in India across 20 states based on 89 questions.
Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy (Janaagraha), a Bengaluru-based non-profit organization in their 5th edition of its Annual Survey of India’s City-Systems (ASICS) report has revealed that Pune, Kolkata and Thiruvananthapuram is at the first three spot in terms of governance in cities in the country. The survey edition covered 23 major cities in India across 20 states based on 89 questions.
The ASICS score for Pune is 5.7, followed by Kolkata, Thiruvananthapuram and Bhubaneswar at 4.6 score respectively. Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Dehradun, Patna and Chennai constituted the bottom five cities with scores in the range of 3.0 to 3.3 on 10.In comparison the global benchmarks of Johannesburg, London and New York which scored 7.6, 8.8 and 8.8 respectively.
City Wise ASICS Scores across the 4 City-Systems components
| City | ASICS 2017 SCORE | ASICS 2017 RANK | UPD | UCR | ELPR | TAP |
| Pune | 5.1 | 1 | 2.8 | 7.3 | 4.9 | 5.5 |
| Kolkata | 4.6 | 2 | 3.7 | 4.5 | 6.3 | 4.0 |
| Thiruvananthapuram | 4.6 | 3 | 2.8 | 3.5 | 6.5 | 5.5 |
| Bhubaneswar | 4.6 | 4 | 4.2 | 4.6 | 4.7 | 4.8 |
| Surat | 4.5 | 5 | 3.6 | 5.2 | 5.5 | 3.8 |
| Delhi | 4.4 | 6 | 5.1 | 4.2 | 5.3 | 3.0 |
| Ahmedabad | 4.4 | 7 | 3.5 | 5.0 | 5.6 | 3.5 |
| Hyderabad | 4.3 | 8 | 3.0 | 5.2 | 3.3 | 5.5 |
| Mumbai | 4.2 | 9 | 2.9 | 5.9 | 4.9 | 3.2 |
| Ranchi | 4.1 | 10 | 2.0 | 3.7 | 6.0 | 4.7 |
| Raipur | 4.0 | 11 | 2.5 | 3.7 | 5.5 | 4.4 |
| Kanpur | 3.9 | 12 | 2.7 | 4.3 | 4.3 | 4.2 |
| Lucknow | 3.8 | 13 | 2.4 | 4.1 | 4.3 | 4.5 |
| Guwahati | 3.8 | 14 | 2.5 | 3.5 | 4.8 | 4.4 |
| Bhopal | 3.7 | 15 | 2.3 | 3.6 | 4.5 | 4.2 |
| Ludhiana | 3.5 | 16 | 3.0 | 3.0 | 4.1 | 3.9 |
| Visakhapatnam | 3.4 | 17 | 2.6 | 3.8 | 2.8 | 4.6 |
| Jaipur | 3.4 | 18 | 3.4 | 3.3 | 4.7 | 2.1 |
| Chennai | 3.3 | 19 | 2.9 | 4.0 | 4.1 | 2.0 |
| Patna | 3.3 | 20 | 2.6 | 3.3 | 4.8 | 2.4 |
| Dehradun | 3.1 | 21 | 2.4 | 3.3 | 4.8 | 1.8 |
| Chandigarh | 3.1 | 22 | 1.8 | 4.4 | 3.6 | 2.5 |
| Bengaluru | 3.0 | 23 | 3.0 | 3.0 | 2.9 | 3.0 |
| London | 8.8 | - | 7.9 | 9.7 | 9.4 | 8.2 |
| New York | 8.8 | - | 8.0 | 9.8 | 8.8 | 8.5 |
| Johannesburg | 7.6 | - | 5.3 | 8.8 | 8.8 | 7.6 |
(Cities were ranked on the basis of scores on four key components of governance: urban planning and design; urban capacities and resources; empowered and legitimate political representation; transparency, accountability and participation. Overall scores given in the range of 0 to 10 Credits: ASICS report)
Presenting a grim picture, the survey has revealed that scores in the range of 3 to 5.1, with 12 out of 23 cities below 4 on 10, strongly signals that Indian cities are grossly under-prepared to deliver a high quality of life that is sustainable in the long term. The recurring floods, garbage crises, fire accidents, building collapses, air pollution and dengue outbreaks are only symptoms of this deeper governance crisis in the cities.
The report highlights five systematic challenges that need to be immediately looked into so that the cities get to deliver a better quality of life to citizens in a sustainable manner. Some of the problems mentioned were, lack of a modern, contemporary framework of spatial planning of cities and design standards for public utilities such as roads, footpaths, bus stops and other underground utilities such as water and sewerage networks. Secondly, weak finances, both in terms of financial sustainability and financial accountability of cities. Thirdly, poor human resource management, in terms of number of staff, skills and competencies of staff, organization design and performance management. Powerless mayors and city councils and severe fragmentation of governance across municipalities and state departments and finally, total absence of platforms for systematic citizen participation and lack of transparency in finances and operations of cities.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 15, 2018 11:43 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).