Colonial modernism and the flawed paradigms of urban renewal: uneven development in Bombay, 1900–25

Abstract

This article explores the failure of urban renewal in Bombay city during the ®rst quarter of the twentieth century. It shows how colonial rule structured a class-driven process of uneven urban`improvements' that actually exacerbated the problems of congestion, bad housing and environmental blight. In this process, the new forces of modernity were selectively appropriated to accentuate the differentiation in built forms and urban spaces. Finally, through implicit comparisons with contemporary developments in Europe, it reveals the limitations of urban regeneration in a laissez-faire colonial capitalist environment where the search for quick returns by competing economic actors precluded the adoption of long-term policies and interventionist strategies necessary to create the good city life.

Governing the Contaminated City: Infrastructure and Sanitation in Colonial and Post‐Colonial Bombay

“…Similar changes are taking place in other cities, and have been characterized by some commentators as indicative of a ‘postdevelopment state’ marked by graduated sovereignties of unequal biopolitical investment in different categories of population (Ong, 1999; and see Bunnell and Coe, 2005, on Malaysia; Chronopoulos, 2006, on Buenos Aires). As Bunnell and Coe (2005: 845) argue in relation to zoning technologies in East and Southeast Asia, these processes are not wholly new, but have their origins in Western colonial practices and enclaves (see Klein, 1986; Hazareesingh, 2001; Sidaway, 2007).…”

Connections and Disconnections: The Making of Bombay/Mumbai as India’s “Global City”

“…There were massive investments in grand architectural projects at the expense of critical issues such as housing, transportation, health, and public services that concerned the majority of the city residents (Hazareesingh, 2001). Therefore, as Hazareesingh (2001) puts it, "the economy of Bombay was reasonably affluent in the early twentieth century: only its people remained poor" (p. 255). The systematic antipoor bias of the colonial officials was especially evident at the time of the bubonic plague that hit the city in 1896.…”

Codes of Contention: Building Regulations in Colonial Bombay, 1870‐1912

“…Urban regulations were framed and implemented within a political and economic configuration of financial speculation and conflicting interests around land (for the broader political and economic context, see Kosambi ; Dossal ; Hazareesingh ; Kidambi ; Arnold ). An important aspect of this configuration was the conflict between the emerging municipal sphere and technocratic state agencies.…”

“…The key difference was that BMC was an institution of self‐governance, with representation and limited franchise for the Indian population, while the BIT was a non‐elected technocratic agency. Even though the Board of the BIT included members from the Municipal Corporation, formal institutional arrangements mandated by law were in favor of the BIT and made BIT‐BMC conflicts inevitable (Arnold ; Beverley ; Hazareesingh ; Kidambi ). The BIT's mandate was sanitary improvement, or ‘sanitary regeneration’ of the city through the formulation and implementation of improvement schemes, street schemes and the provision of chawl or dormitory style accommodation for the working classes.…”

“…For example, the Trust demolished more houses than it rebuilt, the pace of work was slow, houses weren't constructed to the requirements of residents and rents were too expensive. As a result, prices increased and landlords further sub‐divided buildings and rooms, adding new floors to existing buildings thus defeating the purpose of building codes (Arnold ; Hazareesingh ; Kidambi ).…”