Low-income housing development in India: Strategies for income mixing and inclusive urban planning

Abstract

ABSTRACT Federal housing programs in rapidly urbanizing countries like India are targeting the expansion of low-income housing stocks. However, most of these large-scale low-income housing developments occur in the urban peripheries, and they are cut off from opportunities and essential urban infrastructure. They not only indicate policy failure but also exacerbate urban segregation in growing cities. Federal policies to tackle these problems in India are geared toward relatively small-scale mixed-income initiatives like inclusionary housing and public-private partnerships. Evaluating these efforts based on four cases in the city of Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh, this paper expands the literature on social-mix and mixed-income housing initiatives that is dominated by studies from the Global North. It identifies multi-pronged approaches to address (1) the failure of the current Indian federal policy involving small-scale mixed-income initiatives, and (2) the need to integrate housing initiatives with urban development at multiple levels, especially in the urban peripheries.