Urbanisation and Migration

Abstract

In this chapter, we focus on issues relating to urbanisation and migration in order to understand if urbanisation has contributed to reduction in poverty. In Chap. 4, we noted that much of the economic growth is originating from the urban areas and within the urban areas, the large cities due to agglomeration effects tend to offer greater advantages and emerge as the major sources of economic growth. Because of higher levels of productivity and wages in the urban areas in general and large cities in particular, the consumption poverty at least is expected to be lower than in the rural areas. Rural migrants from the backward regions are expected to benefit by migrating into large cities. In the broad context of the debate on India’s inclusive growth, it is, therefore, pertinent to analyse aspects of rural-to-urban migration and pose the question if the process has actually contributed to reduction in poverty.