Urban Administration Social Studies - Urban Administration

Garbage collection in the several, Municipal Corporations across the country is undertaken by the workers:

Which agency replaces the broken street lights, collects the garbage, provides water supply, keeps the market clean?

Which one is not the job of the Municipal Corporation?

The Municipal Corporation collects money in different forms like property taxes, water taxes, education taxes, etc. True/ False

In democratic India, sovereign power lies with the people. True/ False

A contract worker is not a permanent employee of a company. He is hired for a specific task or project. True/ False

Municipal Corporation Formulate the laws. True/ False

What is a Municipal Council?

Which is the cleanest city in India?

Define sub-contracting.

Why Surat came in notice earlier in 1990's?

What do we call the elected members in a panchayat?

What is a city? Why some cities are called metropolitan cities?

How does the Municipal Corporation earn the money to do its work?

Define Plague.

Did Yasmin Khala have to make interesting decisions like this when she worked in the Municipal Corporation?

What was the reason for the spread of plague in Surat?

List the qualifications that are needed to become the member of the municipality.

Where was the First Municipal Corporation of India established?

How is the Municipal Corporation elected and how does it work?

What are ill effects of garbage lying all over in the streets?

Discuss In the two photographs you see different ways of collecting and disposing garbage.

1. Which way do you think provides safety to the person disposing garbage?
2. What are the dangers of collecting garbage in the manner shown in the first photograph?
3. Why do you think that proper ways of disposing garbage are not available to those who work in municipalities?

Write a note on municipality or municipal council.

Explain the features of the Municipal Corporation.

Are private initiatives possible in a Municipality?

Name four offices who work for the maintenance of civil amenities and services in a district.

Who decides different tasks to be done?

Several poor people in the city work as domestic servants as well as work for the Corporation, keeping the city clean. Yet the slums in which they live are quite filthy. This is because these slums seldom have any water and sanitation facilities. The reason often given by the Municipal Corporation is that the land in which the poor have set up their homes does not belong to them and that slum-dwellers do not pay taxes. However, people living in middle-class neighborhoods pay very little in taxes compared to the amount of money the corporation spends on them in setting up parks, street lighting facilities, regular garbage collection etc. Also as you read in this chapter, the property taxes collected by the Municipality makes up only 25-30 percent of its money.
Why do you think it is important that the Corporation should spend more money on slum localities ? Why is it important that the Municipal Corporation provide the poor in the city with the same facilities that the rich get ?

How does the Municipal Corporation earn the money to do its work?

An Event Box :
The city of Surat had a plague scare in 1994. Surat was one of the dirtiest cities in India. Houses, hotels and restaurants would dump their garbage into the nearest drain or street which made it very difficult for sweepers to collect and transfer the garbage into selected dumps. In addition to this, the Municipal Council did not collect the garbage as often as it should have and this led to the situation getting worse. The plague spreads through the air and people who have the disease have to he isolated. In Surat, several people lost their lives, and over 300,000 deserted the town. The scare of the plague ensured that the municipal council completely cleaned up the city. To this date, Surat continues to remain the second cleanest city in India after Chandigarh.
1. Do you know when and how often garbage gets collected in your neighbourhood ?
2. Do you think it is the same for all neighbourhoods in the city ? Why not ? Discuss.

Question Box :
How does the Municipal Corporation get its money ?

Rehana's house was the closest and they ran and told her mother what had happened. Rehana's mother said, "I don't really know these things in great detail but I do know that it is the Municipal Corporation of the city that takes care of replacing lights. The best person to ask would be Yasmin Khala. She just retired from the Municipal Corporation. Go and ask her, and Rehana come back home soon."
Yasmin Khala lived in the same lane and she and Rehana's mother were good friends. The children ran to Khala's house and when she opened the door they began to tell her what had happened all at once! When they asked about the street light, Yasmin Khala laughed and said, "There is no one person that you can pay the money to. There is a big organisation called the Municipal Corporation that takes care of street lights, garbage collection, water supply, keeping the streets and the market clean."
"I've heard about the Municipal Corporation. They've put up signs around the city to inform people about Malaria," said Mala.
"Yes, you are quite right. The Municipal Corporation is also responsible for ensuring that diseases do not break out in the city. It also runs schools, hospitals, and dispensaries. And makes gardens and maintains them," said Yasmin Khala. Then she added, "Our city Pune is a big city and so here it is called a Municipal Corporation. In smaller towns, it is called a Municipal Council."
List at least four different tasks that the Municipality does :