'Have an SEZ-type approach for development'

At a time when Gurgaon is passing through a "challenging" phase with problems of water, power, transport, drainage and even sewerage, Business Standard's Vandana Gombar caught up with the man who is credited with developing the city when it just comprised "scraggly trees" - Kushal Pal Singh, the chairman of DLF Ltd, the country's largest real estate developer.

Here is his take on what went wrong in Gurgaon and other urban areas across the country, and his solutions.

Mistakes in city planning:
There has been a complete absence of the foresight on the part of the planners. That is the tragedy in India.

The planning of a city should be done in accordance with the vision of the developer. It should not be done by a bureaucrat or a town planner. Why do people talk about Lutyens' Delhi even now, or of Chandigarh?

These are the results of urban planners-developers with great visions. When you plan something for a city, you don't think for three-four-five decades. You think couple of hundred years ahead, because, as a city grows, infrastructure should be able to take care of the growth.

Take the congestion on the express highway (linking Gurgaon to Delhi). It means that the planners have not thought it through. The roads inside Gurgaon are also congested, and Gurgaon is just 25-30 per cent developed. Balance development is still to come. You can imagine the chaos which that will bring.

The fundamental mistake "" elimination of the private sector:
Whereas there was a continued role of the private sector in every facet of economic development of the country, this sector was eliminated in the real estate sector with the nationalisation of urban development in the 1950s. It was done with a noble objective.

The government, which was concerned by haphazard development, wanted prices to remain within the reach of common man and to ensure planned development.

Unfortunately, exactly the opposite has happened. There is no planned development and prices have skyrocketed "" both rental and capital. Because the gap created by the elimination of professional developers was filled in by the unauthorised fly-by-night developers.

See any city in the country and you will find unauthorised development. These were constructed in violation of prescribed norms by unauthorised developers and fly-by-night operators in cahoots with the powers that be, and the result is a mess all over India.

If you make a mistake and buildings are constructed, you cannot demolish them, because public reaction is so strong. Once buildings have been constructed, how do you broaden the road. How do you bring new infrastructure? It is not only a legal issue but also a political one. Mistakes in urban development cannot be corrected for generations.

Public sector's role should be limited to regulation:
The government and the public sector should adopt the role of a regulator, enabler and facilitator.

Today, they are developers also and that is how the mess has come about. The planning is archaic. Once broad town planning parameters are given, the entire planning should be done by the private sector. Today, you cannot change the width of the road even by inches. You cannot change specifications prescribed.

Think big, create surpluses:
That is the only mantra which is needed along with a change in people's attitude. We have to move away from managing shortages and thinking small. SEZ is the correct way to go but there should be no limit on the area.

In fact, the government should facilitate an even larger supply of land. Besides, it should change its vision to evolve an SEZ-type approach towards urban development.

Let the private developer plan the entire area within the broad parameters of the government and let them plan with a higher floor-area ratio. The key thing is to permit higher utilisation of the land factor.

If I were real estate minister:
I would revamp the existing set-up of the development authority. Their (developers') role should be confined to regulation. They should no longer be developers.

The task of development should be entrusted to selected pre-qualified developers on the basis of competitive bidding. They would do the entire development on a site within the broad parameters prescribed by the government.

I would revamp the slums through a refined version of the Mumbai model of slum development and prescribe mandatory arrest for any person involved in unauthorised development.