<div>What’s common between Thane and Tennessee or between Dombivli and Delaware? Apparently, there’s a lot.</div><div> </div><div>Proud suburbanites across Goregaon and Gurgaon may not be aware of this but many of them are living the quintessential American suburban dream. The ‘suburbanisation’ of America, of course, started way back in the mid-1940s and continues unabated till date. For the uninitiated, American suburbanisation – triggered by the end of World War-II, and coupled with lifting of spending curbs in the US and a whole host of financial sops by the US Federal government – saw millions of Americans setting up homes in the suburbs – away from the hustle and bustle of the city centers or from distant rural areas – for want of a better quality of life.</div><div> </div><div>Kenneth T. Jackson, the famous American social historian, wrote that 18 of America’s top 25 cities suffered a net loss of population between 1950 and 1970 with US suburban population doubling from 37 to 74 million people during the same time period.</div><div> </div><div>India too is witnessing a mass movement to the suburbs. In Mumbai, for example, the share of population between island and suburbs has completely reversed with time. In the early 1960s (Source: Urban Environmental Evolution: The Case of Mumbai by Dr. Sudhakar Yedla), the island city (then Bombay) used to house 68 per cent of the population, while the remaining 32 per cent lived in the suburbs. The 1990s and 2000s saw suburban population completely overtaking their city counterparts. Currently, it is estimated that more than 80 per cent of Mumbai’s population lives in the suburbs. The numbers include Mumbaikars, who have moved from Girgaon to Goregaon (central districts to the suburbs), and migrant households from other parts of Maharashtra and/or from other states. There is a clear trend where the existing population of central Mumbai is spreading out to satellite towns of Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) such as Kharghar, Sanpada, Vasai, Mira Road, Thane, Kalyan-Dombivli, and all the way to Vasind and Boisar that offer a far better quality of life than the congested by-lanes of central Mumbai. Mumbai is reflecting the pan-Indian trend.</div><div> </div><div>More and more people from Delhi’s Chandni Chowk-Connaught Place or from Kolkata’s Burrabazar area (Central Delhi and Kolkata for people who are unfamiliar) are feeling claustrophobic in the ever-growing commercial humdrum in the neighborhood and the absence of open spaces. The two-bedroom residential premises – which were once perfect for the Indian urban nuclear ‘Hum Do, Humara Do’ family – have now turned grossly inadequate to house the second and the third generations. With 6-8 family members constantly jostling for space and privacy or for that vantage position in front of the living room television, moving into a more spacious home in the suburbs has emerged as a solution for many erstwhile city-dwellers.</div><div> </div><div>City properties across India have become frightfully expensive and are now virtually out of bounds for the Indian middle-class, while suburban residential complexes continue to be available at comparatively reasonable rates.</div><div> </div><div>The twin attractions of comfortable living and affordable rates are hard to ignore and more and more Indian middle-class households are succumbing to the lure of the suburbs – similar to what their American counterparts. If the US government – between 1944 and 1956 – successfully constructed 41,000 miles of interstate highways to facilitate Amercian suburbanisation, the Indian government is also doing its bit by constructing modern railway networks across metros and surrounding suburbs. The Delhi and Kolkata metro networks are already a huge success, while work for the Mumbai and Bengaluru railway networks are underway. Construction of modern roads is also a big priority. Commonwealth Games in Delhi saw the construction of a sizable number of roads, overbridges and underpasses to facilitate travel in Delhi and the National Capital Region (notably Ghaziabad, Noida, Faridabad and Gurgaon). Mumbai civic authorities, meanwhile, have finalised a blue-print to connect Nariman Point (south Mumbai) to Borivali in the western suburbs through a series of overbridges, underground passes and brand new roads. Reclaiming the sea seems to be high on the agenda. The Indian government is undertaking all of these projects to enable suburbanisation across cities.</div><div> </div><div>What’s really important is that a majority of the new Indian suburbanites belong to the affluent and therefore, dominant section of Indian economics. Affluents – traditional and professional – are defined as a distinct group of households with an annual income of US$ 18,500 (approx. Rs 9.25 lakh) and above. This affluent class, according to a February 2012 report put together by BCG and CII, numbers around 13 million households in India. While traditional affluents account for 9 million households, the professional affluents – all of them college graduates and working as executives, managers, journalists, etc., or are self-employed professionals such as chartered accountants, lawyers, or physicians -- number around four million households or just about 2 per cent of total Indian households. Tata Housing’s own statistics suggests that close to 60 per cent of the households who have recently set up homes in the suburbs belong to the professional affluents. Inside the Tata group, we call them the ‘New Affluents’.</div><div> </div><div>If the US, between 1946 and 1964, witnessed the ‘baby boom’ (each year the US averaged 4.6 million babies during this period), Indian suburbia is not to be left behind. A casual stroll in the play-areas of the suburban residential complexes will reveal enough perambulators, while the swings and the see-saws will be invariably full of screaming children. Welcome to modern Indian suburbia, American-style.</div><div><em><br /></em></div><div><em>Brotin Banerjee is the MD & CEO of Tata Housing</em></div>
