Levels of Urbanization in South 24 Parganas District, West Bengal

Sakti Mandal,

PhD Research Scholar, Department of Geography, University of Calcutta, Kolkata

ABSTRACT:

This article focuses on the growth of urbanization. It deals with the concept of urbanization, difference between urbanization and urbanism, level and trend of urbanization in South 24 Parganas, relationship between urbanization and development, in South 24 Parganas. The data has been collected from Census of India, 2001 and other official record. On the basis of the selected indicators, it is concluded that in this district Rajpur-Sonarpur and Maheshtala town have high level, Budge-Budge, Pujali, Chack Kashipur, Chack Enayetnagar, Baruipur, Diamond-Harbour, Jaynagar-Majilpur and Bilandapur have medium level and rest towns have very low level of urbanization.

KEY WORDS: Urbanization, Urbanism, Growth of Population

INTRODUCTION:

There is no universal definition of urban areas. Different countries define urban localities in terms of different factors such as size and density of population, amenities considered to be commonly available in urban areas, major economic activities of population, etc. Also not all those countries which define urban areas in terms of the same factors use the same threshold values for distinguishing urban localities from rural localities. For example, among those countries which define urban areas in terms of minimum size of population, some countries define an area with a minimum population of 5,000 as urban while many countries define smaller places also as urban areas (say areas with a population of 2,000). This makes comparison between levels of urbanization between different countries as somewhat problematic (1).

Urban and Rural Areas in Indian Census

In the Census of India 2001, the definition of urban area adopted is as follows: (a) All statutory places with a municipality, corporation, and cantonment board or notified town area committee, etc. (b) A place satisfying the following three criteria simultaneously:

i) a minimum population of 5,000;

ii) at least 75 per cent of male working population engaged in non- agricultural pursuits; and

iii) a density of population of at least 400 per sq. km. (1,000 per sq. Mile).

For identification of places which would qualify to be classified as 'urban' all villages, which, as per the 1991 Census had a population of 4,000 and above, a population density of 400 persons per sq. km. and having at least 75 per cent of male working population engaged in non-agricultural activity were considered. To work out the proportion of male working population referred to above against (2).

An Urban Agglomeration is a continuous urban spread constituting a town and its adjoining urban outgrowths (OGs) or two or more physically contiguous towns together and any adjoining urban outgrowths of such towns. Examples of OGs are railway colonies, university campuses, port areas, etc., that may come up near a city or statutory town outside its statutory limits but within the revenue limits of a village or villages contiguous to the town or city. Each such individual area by itself may not satisfy the minimum population limit to qualify it to be treated as an independent urban unit but may deserve to be clubbed with the town as a continuous urban spread.

For the purpose of delineation of Urban Agglomerations during Census of India 2001, following criteria are taken as pre-requisites: (a) The core town or at least one of the constituent towns of an urban agglomeration should necessarily be a statutory town; and (b) The total population of all the constituents (i.e. towns and outgrowths) of an Urban Agglomeration should not be less than 20,000 (as per the 1991 Census). With these two basic criteria having been met, the following are the possible different situations in which Urban Agglomerations would be constituted:

(i) a city or town with one or more contiguous outgrowths; (ii) two or more adjoining towns with their outgrowths; and (iii) a city and one or more adjoining towns with their outgrowths all of which form a continuous spread (3).

1.2. Urbanization and Urbanism

In general, however, in studies of population processes a distinction is made between urban and rural areas. All social and demographic characteristics of population vary according to urban-rural residence variable. Urban areas are normally marked by:

Higher literacy, educational achievements and vocational education

Higher standard of living, higher aspirations and more amenities and services

Higher age of marriage

Lower ideal family size, greater use of family planning methods and lower fertility

Better health infrastructure leading to lower mortality and fertility rates

Higher autonomy and empowerment of women

Lower impact of religiosity and supernatural beliefs

Greater impact of globalization, individualization and secularization (4, 5)

2.Objectives

The objectives of the present study are the following:

i)To measurement of Urbanization of the district.

ii) To identify the urban population of different towns.

iii) To analyses the class wise and functional classification of different towns.

iv) To identify the density of urban population.

v) To identify the growth of urban population.

vi) To identify the percentage of urban population to total population.

vii) To find out over all pattern of urbanization.

viii) To suggest some future directions regarding medium and low level of urbanization.

3.Methodology

3.1.Measurements of Urbanization

Urbanization is measured in terms of level (or sometimes called degree) of urbanization and speed of urbanization. Level of urbanization is defined as the percentage of total population of an area that is living in urban localities. All countries classify localities into urban and rural and collect data on their population. Thus Level of urbanization = (Urban population/Total population)*100 (6). Thus if the level of urbanization of a country is 32 percent it implies that out of 100 persons in that country 32 are living in localities classified as urban (i.e., towns and cities). It may be stressed that the level of urbanization is dependent on the definition of urban and rural areas; change in the definition of urban localities may produce significant change in level of urbanization.

Speed of urbanization during a given period is defined as percentage change (per year) in the level of urbanization. Thus the speed of urbanization during 1991-2001 may be calculated as follows :

Speed of urbanization, 1991-2001 = (Difference in the levels of urbanization during 1991- 2001)/ Levels of urbanization in 1991)*100/10 (7).

Table No. 1 Levels and Speed of Urbanization of South 24 Parganas District

Year	Total population	Rural Population	Urban Population	Levels of Urbanization	Speed (trend) of Urbanization
1951	2415068	1956409	458659	18.992	-
1961	3049787	2477752	572035	18.757	-0.126
1971	4101218	3213219	887999	21.652	4.214
1981	5041607	3693491	1348116	26.740	2.346
1991	5715030	4954653	760377	13.305	-5.024
2001	6906689	5820469	1086220	15.727	1.819
2011	8153176	6065179	2087997	25.610	6.284

Source: District Census Handbook

Table no. 2. Classification of towns on the basis of Population Size

Class	Size of Population	Class-wise No. of urban centre’s
I	>1,00,000	2
II	50,000 – 99,999	1
III	20,000 – 49,999	6
IV	10,000 – 19,999	4
V	5,000 – 9,999	6
VI	<5,000	2
All Classes		21

Source: District Census Handbook, 1991.

Table no. 3. Growth in the towns by Class in the District of south 24 Parganas District Since 1901

Year	Size Class of the Towns						Total
Year	I	II	III	IV	V	VI	Total
1901	-	-	-	2	1	1	4
1921	-	-	1	1	2	-	4
1941	-	-	1	2	1	-	4
1951	-	-	1	2	2	-	5
1961	-	-	2	4	-	-	6
1971	-	1	2	4	1	-	8
1981	-	1	4	6	2	-	13
1991	-	2	6	4	2	1	15
2001	2	1	6	4	6	2	21

Source: District Census Handbook, 1991.

6.Class wise Classification of Towns

For the analysis of class–wise classification of urban centres or towns, six categories of urban centres or towns are used by the Census of India. The Indian Census has adopted the population size as the main basis for classifying the urban centres or towns. According to it, all urban settlements are grouped into six classes (Census of India 1991) which differ widely in their population size and characteristics and are recognized separately on the basis of their status. Table-2 provides the distribution of all such centres of the district among the six classes and Table-3 comprises the number of urban centres of such class on a time scale.Table-4 and figure-2 clearly shows the changes in class position among the municipalities and number of various classes of urban centres of this district from 1901 to 2001.

Table no. 4. Changes in Class position among the Towns of South 24 Parganas District (1901-2001)

Sl. No	Name of the Towns	Present Status	1901	1921	1941	1951	1961	1971	1981	1991	2001
1	Maheshtala	M	-	-	-	-	-	V	IV	III	I
2	Chata kalikapur	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	IV	IV	III
3	Balarampur	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	VI
4	Uttar Raypur	CT	-	-	-	-	-	IV	IV	IV	III
5	Budge Budge	M	IV	III	III	III	III	II	II	II	II
6	Pujali	M	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	III	III
7	Birlapur	CT	-	-	-	-	IV	IV	III	III	IV
8	Chack Kashipur	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	V	V	IV
9	Bowali	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	IV	IV	IV
10	Raghunathpur	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	V
11	Rajpur Sonarpur	M	IV	IV	IV	IV	III	III	III	II	I
12	Bishupur	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	VI	VI
13	Kanyanagar	CT	-	-	-	-	-	V	V	IV	IV
14	Amtala	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	V	V
15	Chack Enayetnagar	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	V
16	Baruipur	M	VI	V	V	V	IV	III	III	III	III
17	Uttar Kalash	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	V
18	Diamond Harbour	M	-	-	-	V	IV	IV	III	III	III
19	Bilandapur	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	V
20	Uttar Durgapur	CT	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	V
21	Jaynagar Majilpur	M	V	V	IV	IV	IV	IV	IV	III	III

Source: District Census Handbook, 1991.

Table no. 5. Density of Population in Different Towns of South 24 Parganas District (2001)

Category	Population/ sq.km	Size Class of the Towns						Total	Name of the Towns
Category	Population/ sq.km	I	II	III	IV	V	VI	Total	Name of the Towns
Very High	Above 8000	1	1	-	-	2	-	4	Budge Budge (M), Maheshtala (M), Bilandapur (CT), Chack Enayetnagar (CT)
High	6001-8000	1	-	-	1	1	-	3	Rajpur-Sonarpur (M), Chack Kashipur (CT), Uttar Kalash (CT)
Moderate	4001-6000	-	-	2	2	2	-	6	Jaynagar Majilpur (M), Baruipur (M), Amtala (CT), Birlapur (CT), Uttar Durgapur (CT), Kanyanagar (CT),
Low	Below 4000	-	-	4	1	1	2	8	Pujali (M), Diamond Harbour (M), Raghunathpur (CT), Bishnupur (CT), Bowali (CT), Balarampur (CT), Ckack Kalikapur (CT), Uttar Raypur (CT)

Areas of Low Growth Rate towns like Uttar Raypur, Budge Budge, Kanyanagar, Baruipur and Birlapur, Bowali, Bishnupur are the comprising 26.84% of the urban population of the district. The growth ranges from 5.1% in Budge-Budge to 19.3% in Baruipur and 16.2% in Uttar Raypur. It is to be noted that Bowali (-21.5%), Birlapur (-18.7%) and Bishnupur (-5.0%) census town (class IV, IV and VI) recorded negative growth rate due to decentralization of population to another urban unit. Areas of Moderate Growth Rate comprising very minute (4.00) percent of the district. Chata Kalikapur 23.7%, Chack Kashipur 34.0%, Diamond-Harbour (23.00%) and Amtala 26.3% towns are included in the area of moderate growth rate. High Growth Rate areas comprising 69.58% of the urban population of the district. Three towns viz. Maheshtala (M), Pujali (M) and Rajpur-Sonarpur (M) are included as the area of high growth rate comprising 233.01%, 234.81% and 459.60% decadal growth. Among three towns Maheshtala and Rajpur-Sonarpur is the Class I town. So it is clear that the district has three municipality towns which are comprise to about 70% of the urban population.

10. Findings

It is to be noted that the percentage distribution of urban population among twenty one towns of South 24 Parganas district, shows that Class I towns have highest percentage distribution of 66.47% followed by class III town covering 16.56%. The lowest percentage distribution of urban population is to be found in class V towns. By summing the weight age of all the indicators in a town composite score have derived to express the overall picture of urbanization (Table No.8 & Fig.No.5). There are two

patches of high urbanization. The first comprising of Rajpur-Sonarpur situated in the north-central part of the study area. The second consisting of Maheshtala is situated in the North-western part of the study area. The highest score obtained by Rajpur-Sonarpur (19.88) followed by Maheshtala (11.52). As many as 10% towns of the study area have high urbanization. There are 30% towns which fall in the medium category of urbanization.

Table No. 6 Decadal urban growth

Category	Growth Rate in %	Number of Towns	% Share of Total Urban Population of the District
Low	Below 20.00	7	26.84
Moderate	21.00 – 40.00	4	4.00
High	Above 40.00	3	69.58

9. Percentage of Urban Population

The percentage of urban population to total population is 15.72 percent in the urban areas in this district which is very lower than that of the state of West Bengal (28.03%). The district falling in different categories of urbanization are as follows (Table No. 7 & Fig no.4).

Table No. 7 Percentage of Urban population to Total Population of the District

Category	% of Urban Population to Total Urban Population	Number of Towns	Name of the Towns
High	Above 10.00	2	Maheshtala, Rajpur-Sonarpur
Moderate	2.00 – 10.00	5	Budge-Budge, Baruipur, Diamond-Harbour, Pujali and Jaynagar-Majilpur
Low	Below 2.00	14	Chack-Kalikapur, Uttar-Raypur, Birlapur, Chack-Kashipur, Balarampur, Bowali, Raghunathpur, Bishnupur, Kanyanagar, Amtala, Chack Enayetnagar, Uttar Kalash, Bilandapur, Uttar Durgapur

CONCLUSION:

These urban areas or towns of this district are the centres of trade and commerce as well as service centres of their hinter lands. All towns are unplanned where the primary activity still dominates in the urban environment leading to haphazard growth offering by the migrants came from their hinter lands due to huge job opportunity and facilitate to medical and education. Rapid growth rate of population, lack of urban amenities, lack of land use management, housing problem, inadequate transport or infrastructural facilities, waste and sewage disposal, lack of water supply, power shortage, absence of parking places for vehicles, lack of fixed price markets, storage facilities, lack of wholesale market, narrowness of the roads, lack of health facilities, lower the availability of funds, lack of proper plan, environmental hazards like floods, are some serious problems of the different urban centers of south 24 Parganas district. They have enough scope to development activities. Besides, these towns have the potentialities to develop not only as a nodal growth centre for the agriculture based products and small scale industries but also as an advantage of growth pole of capital city Kolkata.

Table No. 8 Weightage Indicators

Name of the Towns	Population per urban centre (in thousands)	% of Urban population to total population	Decadal Growth (1991-2001)	Density of Urban Population	Total
Maheshtala	7.449	1.900	0.755	1.419	11.523
Chata kalikapur	0.388	0.099	0.553	0.577	1.617
Balarampur	0.091	0.023	0.000	0.536	0.65
Uttar Raypur	0.394	0.100	0.378	0.623	1.495
Budge Budge	1.460	0.372	0.119	1.356	3.307
Pujali	0.654	0.167	5.480	0.648	6.949
Birlapur	0.384	0.098	-0.436	0.668	0.714
Chack Kashipur	0.215	0.055	0.796	1.142	2.208
Bowali	0.197	0.050	-0.502	0.458	0.203
Raghunathpur	0.096	0.024	0.000	0.540	0.66
Rajpur Sonarpur	6.510	1.661	10.726	0.990	19.887
Bishnupur	0.087	0.022	-0.117	0.407	0.399
Kanyanagar	0.197	0.050	0.236	0.921	1.404
Amtala	0.146	0.037	0.618	0.808	1.609
Chack Enayetnagar	0.109	0.027	0.000	2.003	2.139
Baruipur	0.868	0.221	0.450	0.805	2.344
Uttar Kalash	0.105	0.026	0.000	0.988	1.119
Diamond Harbour	0.719	0.183	0.537	0.584	2.023
Bilandapur	0.110	0.028	0.000	2.069	2.207
Uttar Durgapur	0.097	0.024	0.000	0.749	0.87
Jaynagar Majilpur	0.450	0.115	0.357	0.732	1.654