Urban Surge

India’s federal compact, frequently invoked but rarely invigorated, often stumbles under the weight of political parochialism and bureaucratic entropy. But at the recent NITI Ayog meeting chaired by PM Narendra Modi, a few CMs defied this pattern by enriching the Centre’s vision instead of defying it. The gathering, intended to forge a cooperative agenda for investment, job creation and reform, produced pragmatic interventions from N. Chandrababu Naidu and A. Revanth Reddy.

Naidu’s suggestion of three sub-groups: one to boost GDP growth via investment, manufacturing and exports backed by viability gap funding for public-private partnerships; a second to address population management and the dual challenges of demographic dividend and ageing; and a third to drive technology-based governance using AI, drones, quantum computing and digital platforms for real-time, citizen-centric administration was notable.

Few state leaders have been better aligned or more ready to operationalise these aims than Naidu, a self-styled technocrat. He understands that boosting manufacturing and jobs is not just about tax incentives or land acquisition but about building modern, liveable cities where investors and talent want to stay. A state-specific mission under the umbrella of the Centre’s sub-group framework could act as a laboratory for the integration of tech-based governance tools. With Naidu’s track record of adopting real-time dashboards and biometric systems, Andhra Pradesh could well serve as a proving ground for the Centre’s ambitions around AI and citizen-centric digital governance.

If Naidu spoke the language of structural reform, Telangana’s Revanth Reddy articulated the need for strategic scale. His proposal for a national task force led by the Prime Minister and comprising the chief ministers of India’s six largest metropolitan economies - Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Chennai and Hyderabad - is as radical as it is rational. These cities account for nearly 40 percent of India’s urban GDP but remain shackled by fragmented jurisdiction and overstretched services.

A central task force could transcend these silos, harmonise regulations, pool infrastructure investment and align metropolitan growth with national priorities. Such a mechanism has international precedent: Germany’s city-regional partnerships, the European Union’s urban agenda, and China’s special economic zones all illustrate what’s possible when major cities are treated not as administrative headaches but as engines of growth.

The success of the Centre’s sub-groups will depend less on press releases and more on political will, particularly the willingness to devolve authority and funds to states. The technology-led governance model will fail if it rests on tokenistic pilot projects or is deployed in silos without state capacity. And urban missions will falter if they repeat the fragmented funding patterns that hobbled previous efforts like the Smart Cities programme. Still, the Centre should not merely record these ideas but should adopt, fund and empower them. India’s transformation will not come from the Centre alone. It will come from states and cities only when they are given the tools, and the trust, to lead.