India’s urban future is at an intersection

AS is faster in summer, Indian cities are struggling with lack of water and electricity demand and temperature. The report from Bengaluru and Hyderabad shows a spike in water tanker booking, while power cuts are loom due to the use of air-conditioner. These annual conflicts raise a pressure question – are our cities where more than 30% of Indians live, climate is ready for extreme and rapid urbanization?

Bringing about urbanization, growth and opportunities, also paves the way for pollution, crowd and environmental effects, which is often the most difficult to the underprivileged. Sustainable Futures Collective, in its report, ‘Is India ready for a hot world?’ (2025), we find that a lot of long -term plan for climate change in cities has to be done. Concerns about how our cities are handling urban heat island effects have also been raised often in Parliament. Such Stark Ground Reality outlined the challenges facing our cities in advancing sustainable development target -11 (SDG -11): to create inclusive, safe, flexible and permanent urban environment by 2030.

Do index capture reality?

While global SDG -11 indicators are present, there is a lack of city -level equipment for effective tracking in India. The Niti Aayog’s SDG Urban Index ranks 56 cities on 77 indicators, but its SDG-11 component is limited to four: Swachh Survekshan, Road Deaths, PMAY-Uaring, and Waste Treater. Ease of living index involves 111 cities, but lacks a comprehensive SDG -11 evaluation.

The International Index such as Mercer and The Economist’s resilients cities index insights offer but Miss Indian Ground Reality. The absence of a concentrated SDG-11 index obstructs policy-makers to identify the really safe, durable and inclusive cities, creating a policy-frequency interval.

Four different indices have been created in our latest research to bridge this gap and to complement the indices used by Niti Aayog, one for each column of SDG-11, one for each column of SDG-11, in which we have rode for 10 major cities (Hyderabad, Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai, Mumbai, Kelkate, JPur, AHMDAB. Nine indicators were used, 19 for inclusion, and 15 flexibility and stability index. The parameters used to define. Climateological tables, and a novel-division (for indices because it provides a more purposeful approach to waiting to find out the moving of climatological tables, and Ola Mobility Institute.

Results provide significant insight into SDG -11 implementation in cities. Among the 10 major cities analyzed, Ahmedabad ranked first in inclusion, while Jaipur finished the least. Bangalore appeared to be the safest city, while Kolkata stood the lowest in security. Surat led the stability, while Kolkata lagged behind. In the context of climate flexibility, Chennai stood first, while Jaipur was the least flexible. Niti Aayog’s SDG-111 is shown to be compared with ranking that cities have been tagged as front-colors and artists, which perform poorly in our indices.

Variations in the inclusive index reflect inequalities in social and economic participation, emphasize the need for equal access to opportunities in urban planning and wide the idea of ​​inclusion. The difference in safety ranking suggests that while some cities benefit from vigorous law enforcement, others require better crime prevention and urban security strategies. Stability ranking reveals uneven progression in environmental plan, waste management and pollution control, emphasizing the need for comprehensive stability policies. Inequality in flexibility highlights gaps in disaster preparations and recovery. In particular, the annual survey of the Indian City System 2023 by Janwa reported that there were ‘city stability scheme’ in only 16 cities, while 17 had ‘city flexibility strategies’. This indicates significant intervals in the ground work required for SDG -11 to make adequate progress in India.

Ahead road

India’s urban future is at an intersection. Cities should install better mechanisms to track SDG-11 at urban local bodies (ULB) levels. While some states and center areas have adopted the district-level monitoring structure, urban local bodies should follow the suit. The integrated command and control center developed under the Smart Cities Mission should be availed to collect real -time data and increase urban planning and development processes. Additionally, it is important to address their needs, as about one third of urban residents are poor. India still depends on the census 2011 data, which is severely underestimated urban poverty. To bridge this difference, periodic urban poor quality of living survey at the state level is necessary.

Each city (small and large) faces unique challenges, requiring localized governance, better plan and city-specific strategies. It is important to address these differences through data-supported, city-specific policies.

Alok Kumar Mishra, Professor, School of Economics, University of Hyderabad; Pawan Kumar Thmmavjala, Research Associate, School of Economics, Hyderabad University