India needs more cities, better municipal laws: Chidambaram

India needs to build more cities and update laws, which regulate municipalities, to meet the growing needs of urbanisation, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said today.
"The laws that govern our municipalities and corporations deserve to be thrown out and replaced by a modern law that understands what the central government does," he said while releasing a book, 'Transforming Our Cities' by Isher Judge Ahluwalia.
"We need to limit the size of cities, we need to build new cities. Building new cities is not new to India," he said, adding that there are new cities, like Gandhinagar in Gujarat and Navi Mumbai in Maharashtra.

Talking about governance of cities, Chidambaram took a dig at Gujarat Chief Minister and BJP's Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, saying "there are well governed cities outside Gujarat".
"Since we are fed with the daily diet of what happens in Gujarat and what happens in Gujarat alone, I think I will share with you ... I am happy to report there are well governed cities in my state too," he said.
Chidambaram further said that if Telangana Bill is passed the state will have a new capital.