In sharp contrast to Western European countries like
Britain, Indian cities did not mushroom in the nineteenth century
colonial period. The pace of urbanisation in India was slower than
western Europe under colonial rule.
- Bombay was the Premier city of the three Presidency cities.
- Bombay as compared to London went through various phases in the making of a premier city.
i.) At first, Bombay was the major outlet for cotton textiles from Gujarat.
ii.)
Later, in the nineteenth century, the city functioned as a port
through which large quantities of raw materials such as cotton and
opium would pass.
iii.) Gradually, it also became an important administrative centre in western India,
iv.) By the end of the nineteenth century, it became a major industrial centre.
- Bombay was a crowded city. While every Londoner in the 1840s enjoyed an average space of 155 square yards, Bombay had a mere 9.5 square yards.
- By 1872, when London had an average of 8 persons per house, the density in Bombay was as high as 20.
- The Bombay Fort area which formed the heart of the city in the early 1800s was divided between a ‘native’ town, where most of the Indians lived, and a European or ‘white’ section.
- A European suburb and an industrial zone began to develop to the north of the Fort settlement area, with a similar suburb and cantonment in the south. This racial pattern was true of all three Presidency cities.
- As compared to the European elite, the richer Parsi, Muslim and upper caste
traders and industrialists of Bombay lived in sprawling mansions.
- Caste and family groups in the mill neighbourhoods were headed by someone who was similar to a village headman. So the caste factor played its role in the Indian context.
- Town planning in London emerged from fears of social revolution, whereas planning in Bombay came about as a result of fears about the plague epidemic. From its earliest days, Bombay did not grow according to any plan.
