India
has been experiencing population and demographic changes
ever since its independence, and an important process associated
with it is the urbanization and growth of urban population.
Urban population rose from about 30 million in 1901 to 300
million by 2001 in India and the level of urbanization steadily
grew from less than 11% of the total population to about
28% during this period. Although the growth of urban population
has receded to some extent in the past decade and dampened
the urbanization phenomenon to some extent (Kundu, 2006),
the absolute levels of current urban population is very
high—much higher than the total urban population of
the World at the dawn of the 19th century.
The
number of urban areas grew from less than 2,000 to about
4,500 by 2001, but there was some inconsistency in the list
as well as number over the time (Kundu, 2006). The share
of larger cities in the total urban population is growing,
for example, Class I cities (cities with more than 100,000
population) now accommodate almost 60% of the total urban
population as compared to about 20% at the beginning of
the 19th Century. Moreover, there is an increasing
tendency towards `metropolitanization' of Indian cities
in the recent past. The number of metropolitan cities (cities
with more than 10 million population, which are also referred
to as mega cities) increased from 4 to 7 and the number
of metros (cities with population more than 1 million) increased
from 23 to 35 during 1991-2001 (Census, 2001). |
