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Reforms in Urban Planning Capacity in India
7.11 STEPS FOR ENHANCING ROLE OF PRIVATE SECTOR
i. Given the magnitude of planning challenges, India needs to be able to generate
solutions for city planning and development at a massive scale. It may not be
feasible to be create such capacities in the public sector at the size and scale
of the urbanisation in India. It is also not feasible or advisable to bring in foreign
expertise for solving problems in whole of the Urban India.
ii. Private-sector companies have the capacity and can efficiently organise planners
and multidisciplinary professionals into teams, nurture their expertise and create
an environment of innovation and problem-solving. Such companies provide
consultancy services in multiple areas such as transport, urban, rural, tourism, ports,
water, sanitation, architecture, etc. Their services broadly include project planning,
master planning, urban design, planning for transit-oriented developments, feasibility
studies, research, documentation, surveying, mapping, geo-spatial analysis, project
structuring, financial modelling, project management, asset management, detailed
engineering design, construction supervision, quality assurance and so on. These
services are required by different public-sector organisations for achieving their
mandates. Currently, this ecosystem is immature in India.
iii. Domestic private sector companies need to be integrated into the domain of urban
planning as they can penetrate every nook and corner of the country, work with the
local bodies and deliver solutions. Moreover, the private sector can envision new
ideas, incubate project ideas, bring in high-quality planning and design services,
and evolve solutions to manage urban transitions.
iv. Therefore, the Advisory Committee, inter alia, recommends that concerted
measures must be taken at multiple levels to strengthen the role of the private
sector to improve the overall planning capacity in the country. This may also
create gainful employment opportunities in this field. The following measures are
recommended:
a. Adoption of Fair Processes for Procuring Technical Consultancy Services:
The ‘Least Cost Selection’ method may not be appropriate in situations
wherein high-level technical expertise is required to undertake urban planning
or urban design assignments. This method often qualifies technically poorer
companies over stronger ones and becomes a disincentive for the private
sector companies to upgrade their technical resources. On the other hand,
the technically poorer company may burden the ULB or citizens through
suboptimal delivery of work, non-performance, and delays. Often, heavy
performance guarantees make it inviable for small companies to grow in the
market. The penalty clauses in the agreements are generally skewed in the
favour of public sector organisations. Issues such as these create unfavourable
conditions for the growth of private sector companies in the planning domain.
Therefore, the Committee recommends innovative and fair procurement
processes to ensure an outstanding quality of consultancy services.
A few examples in this regard are:
FIDIC (Fédération Internationale des Ingénieurs Conseils), or the
International Federation of Consulting Engineers that has been developing