Republic of India Livelihoods in intermediate towns

2.4: Social and Economic Change and the Demographics of Rural-Urban: Considering that there is a socio-spatial equivalence of agriculture with ‘rural’ and concomitantly the village in the institutionalized system of demographic classification in India, it raises pertinent questions about potential transformations in the rural sphere in line with transformations in agriculture and related activities. What also needs to be relooked at are the classifications of what constitutes the urban and the rural according to the state’s system of demographic classification. This has implications for not only how settlements are recognized but also for the delivery of planning and governance in these areas which may otherwise be out of sync.

Therefore, it is equally significant to address the socio-spatiality of what are popularly known as ‘small towns’ whether census or statutory. In the context of India, where “urban” is often specifically defined while “rural” is treated simply as a residual category (Bhagat 2005), it is also important to ‘examine the criteria and limitations of the rural-urban classification followed by the Census, its congruence with the dynamics of state-accorded municipal/non- municipal status and some implications for municipal governance in India’ (Bhagat 2005: 61). According to Bell and Jayane (2006) ‘there is a growing awareness that cities further down the urban hierarchy have as much to tell us about contemporary urban change’, necessitating a need for alternative practices or ways of doing urban and regional research that go beyond ‘metrocentricity’ (Bunnell and Maringati 2010).

For example, the ‘geopolis approach’ (Eric and Marius-gnanou 2011) and the ‘agglomeration index’ (Uchida and Andrew 2010) rework the existing classification of ‘urban’. The geopolis approach identifies as ‘urban’ all physical agglomerates, no matter where, with at least 10,000 inhabitants along with a study of the morphological profiles of individual agglomerates. According to the results thrown up the application of such an approach, there is a greater spread of the country’s metro and secondary cities than had been believed up to now, which is far from a dual model of modern versus traditional, urban versus rural, metro city versus small town (Eric and Marius-gnanou 2011).
Such an understanding is conceptualized by Denis et. al. (2012: 52) through ‘subaltern urbanization’ i.e. ‘the growth of settlement agglomerations, whether denoted urban by the Census of India or not, that are independent of the metropolis and autonomous in their interactions with other settlements, local and global’. This point is further reinforced and extended by studies like Raman (2014), which highlights that the role of the town’s entrepreneurs, local landowners, and politics have been significant factors in shaping the evolution and development of its economy. Similarly Jodhka (2014) during his revisit to two villages in Haryana after twenty years found a significant socio-economic transformations in the internal structure (caste and class relations) of the agrarian economy; the nature of relationships of villages with the neighboring urban settlements in terms of employment and aspirations; and in the emerging nature of power relations in local political institutions’ (Jodhka 2014: 5).
Through their study of Mandi, Gobindgarh in Punjab, Kundu and Bhatia (2002: 8) also suggest that ‘a number of small and medium towns in India have shown high economic growth in recent years, despite their receiving no support from public agencies. It considers socio-cultural factors as extremely important in the development of small and medium towns, even when the market economy plays the dominant role in determining the spatial structure of development’. Another approach that has been used to understand such a phenomenon is that of peri-urbanisation - ‘‘mixed spaces’’, midway between urban centres and rural spaces – transitory spaces subject to rapid and multiple transformations (Dupont 2007). Whether it is subaltern urbanization, in situ urbanization or peri-urbanization, urban consumption growth contributes to growth in the rural non-farm economy (Lanjouw and Murgai 2010).

2.5: Trends in the non-farm economy of Bihar: As mentioned above, Bihar is among the poorest states in India. Its economy is predominantly agrarian with low agricultural productivity and it has a relatively small manufacturing base. However, as mentioned above (see section 1.1), over the past decades or so, the growth rate of Bihar has picked up and many sectors of its economy have been growing at a greater pace than the country as a whole. Reporting from the findings of their studies carried out over the past three decades, Rogers et al argue that the high growth rate of Bihar⁴ since 2011-12 could be attributed to the significant expansion of primarily two sectors, (i) transport and communication, and (ii) trade and construction. The core primary sector and the secondary sector have shown very little growth in comparison to the (non-farm) service sector. For instance, in the period between 2008-11, the contribution of construction, and trade, hotels and restaurants to the GSDP moved to 10.1 percent and 29.3 percent from 3.8 percent and 16.8 percent respectively, having surpassed the contribution of agriculture (Rodgers et al 2013).

Himanshu (2014) too suggests that ‘the spectacular increase’ in non-farm employment in Bihar coincides with a high spending on rural roads construction programmes undertaken by the state government as part of the Prime Minister Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY). Named after the Chief Minister, the state government also initiated a similar programme of road building. In 2012-13, Bihar with 174.88 km of road length per lakh population lagged much behind the all-India (387.53 km) average as before but in terms of road length per 100 sq.km, it by-passed all-India (142.67 km) with a record achievement of 192.78 km and recorded a big jump by over 73 km over the previous year as against only 15 km at all-India level.

Investments on building roads and expansion of transport and communication infrastructure have also changed the village-town relationship, increasing the possibilities of outmigration of the young male population. Datta (2014) in her longitudinal study of migration from the village of Mahisham in Madhubani district states that migration through ‘intermediaries and contractors to work in agriculture have shifted to current rural-urban migration through private individual contacts and network’ enabled particularly by ‘progress in communications such as easier transport and widespread use of mobile phones have changed the context of migration from source areas’.
Another study of migration from Bihar (Deshkingar et. al. 2006) reveals that Madhubani has the highest rate of out-migration and it appears to have increased significantly after the flooding and droughts of 1987 due to ‘poor yields in farming and reduced job opportunities locally’ and ‘over time the proportion of non-farm labourers in the poorest quintile has increased and the proportion of farm workers decreased’ (Deshkingar et. al. 2006: 12). The district also witnessed closure of 18 sugar mills around the same time. As a consequence, nearly 70 percent of the households had one to four male members of the family working outside.