A green facade

Building green is definitely important. But equally important is to know how green is a green building. Take the glitzy, glass-enveloped buildings popping up across the country. It does not matter if you are in the mild but wet and windy climate of Bengaluru or in the extreme hot and dry climate of Gurgaon, glass is the in-thing.

A tale of two cities

I travelled to two different cities in two different states last week—Indore and Guwahati. I came back with images identified by common distinctions: piles of garbage and glitzy new shopping malls. Is this our vision of urban development? There is no question that cities are imploding; growth is happening faster than we ever imagined.

Lavasa exposed

Fishers at bay

When it was introduced in 1991, Coastal Regulation Zone was a blanket notification to protect India's coast and fisherfolk. In 17 years, it was amended--diluted to favour industry--21 times. Now, a new line of management rules might give industry a free run at the cost of fishing communities and environmental concerns. An analysis

Dharavi's real estate threat

Poised on the northern edge of south Mumbai is a piece of real estate developers would love to get their hands on. Rubbing shoulders with upmarket Bandra, Dharavi is known as Asia's largest slum, but it's actually much more than that--it's a settlement in which people live and work, producing a wide array of goods and services. The government's plan to 'redevelop' Dharavi is threatening a huge number of livelihoods.

How green is your building?

Deep waters

  By Arnab Pratim Dutta and Sujit Kumar Singh

Goa must grow...but how?

The official blueprint Goa currently follows is the Regional Plan 2001. It was notified in 1986, and today there is unanimity that this plan has become redundant. For two compelling reasons--both related to conserving the state's natural beauty, but with major implications for land use. First, the Coastal Regulation Zone notification of 1991 restricts development within 500 metres of coastal land as well as land along rivers, estuaries, bays and creeks (wherever tidal effects are left).

India's urban renewal plan goes wrong

On December 3, 2005, prime minister Manmohan Singh launched "the single largest initiative of the Government of India for a planned development of our cities". The programme, the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (jnnurm), acknowledged that urbanisation was a "relentless process" that had caused an acute urban crisis.

Meltdown

Stunted stunt Driven by IT, plagued by it