URBIZEN

Colonial cities are classically dual cities, and Indian cities are no exception. Indian cities have always been dichotomous in nature – traditional & modern, formal & informal, organised & unorganised, etc. And since the political and economic system is biased towards the formal, organised and rich sections of the society, the informal, unorganised and poor sections are left to fend for their own. They occupy the interstitial spaces of the urban environment and based on their limited resources and create environments that mimic their original rural backgrounds and social structures. The informal settlements are basically user-generated models of human settlements employing ingenious use of materials and resources, sometimes self-generated, and sometimes tapped from the city “outside”. The formal city and the user-generated city share a complex symbiotic relationship, and together they form the complex ecosystem of the contemporary Indian City. These two models, running