Thinking from politics in the Land Use Planning of Bangalore

December 26, 2016

Dear All,

As part of our Urban Workshop Series, the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) and Centre de Sciences Humaines (CSH), Delhi, are delighted to invite you to a workshop on Planning and Participation: Thinking from politics in the Land Use Planning of Bangalore by Jayaraj Sundareshan from the Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS), Bangalore.

Date:               Tuesday, 27th December 2016

Time:               3.45 p.m.

Venue:             Conference Hall, Centre for Policy Research, Dharma Marg, Chanakyapuri, New Delhi 110 021

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While a lack of participation dominated critiques of urban planning in India for decades, in the past decade, critiques of participation have occupied a central concern for those who dismiss the Indian urban planning system as exclusivist, elitist, outmoded, technocratic, abstract, and authoritarian, civic, aesthetic or middle class governmentality. How do we understand the participatory process: who participates, how, and when? Does participation happen only during the making of key decisions that underlie ‘the plan’ or also in devising appropriate planning instruments? Or should it also happen during the implementation and enforcement process? Should the participants have a say in every planning application in their neighbourhood and beyond and also in devising the planning system and its governance. These questions will be engaged with to examine the relationship between the epistemological categories of planning and participation based on the experience of land use planning politics in Bangalore.

Jayaraj Sundareshan is a comparative urbanist whose research interest lies at the intersection of urban theory, urban practice and urban transformation. His research interest lies at the intersection of urban theory, urban practice and urban transformation. His primary research field sites are Cities in India and London in the UK. Thematic issues of interest include urban politics and governance, urban morphology, urban commons, planning and design practice, violations and illegalities, ecological transformations, participation, urban activism and communal geographies. Jayaraj has taught at the University College London (UCL), London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS) and National Institute of Technology -C (India). He lives between Kerala, Bangalore and London.