Architect, urbanist and academic, Dr Bimal Patel, who has traversed disciplinary, professional and institutional boundaries to explore how urban design and planning can enrich the lives of people in India’s cities, will give a talk on 'Making Urban Planning Work in India' on Friday, July 14, 2023 from 5.30 pm to 7 pm.
The lecture is part of the 2nd annual conference of the International Centre Goa (ICG), Dona Paula.
WHAT DOES THE LECTURE FOCUS ON?
ICG's lecture will focus on how most Indian towns and cities have statutory urban plans in place.
But these plans, prepared by the state or local planning authorities, are not effective in ensuring planned growth or in guiding infrastructure investments, due to which, most Indian towns and cities are growing haphazardly.
THE DISCUSSANTS
Dr Patel will be joined by two well-known discussants from Goa namely Prof Sebastian Morris and Dean D’Cruz.
1. PROF SEBASTIAN MORRIS
Morris is a senior professor and chair of the Centre for Public Policy and Governance at the Goa Institute of Management (GIM), Sanquelim. He retired from the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad, after over 25 years of teaching, research and consultation. His principal interests are the Indian economy, infrastructure development and regulation, public sector and governance, international trade and investments, macroeconomics and small industry.
He had edited the first four India Infrastructure Reports (IIRs), while the forthcoming IIR2023 on Urban Planning and Governance has also been edited by him.
2. DEAN D'CRUZ
Architect Dean D’Cruz is a graduate of the J J College of Architecture, Mumbai. He set up his practice in Goa in 1989 and co-founded Mozaic Design's architectural wing in 2001.
Sustainability has been at the core of his design ethos, gradually gaining shape and recognition with the urgency of climate change since 2012. He has conducted numerous workshops and seminars on architecture, planning and environment, with works and articles published in leading magazines in India and abroad.
With his interest in collaborations, he has supported the Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm; Oxford Brookes University, UK; and PRATT Institute, New York; with architectural and planning programs in Goa
MAKING URBAN PLANNING WORK
The speaker and the discussants will share their views on why urban planning does not work in India, and how the country is still mired in the thinking and approach of the License-Permit Raj.
They will bring forth insights gained from the liberalisation of urban planning in Gujarat during the late 1990s, and on understanding why planning works where it does. The talk will propose specific ways in which urban planning needs to change if it is to work.
DETAILS
WHERE: International Centre Goa, Dona Paula.
WHEN: Friday, July 4, 2023
TIMINGS: 5.30PM to 7PM
