CENSUS OF INDIA 1971 SERIES-22 WEST BENGAL PART II-A (SUPPLEMENT) STANDARD URBAN AREA.S BHASKAR GROSE of the Indian Administrative Services DIRECTOR OF CENSUS OPERATIONS WEST BENGAL 1971 CENSUS PUBLICATIONS GOVERNMENT OF INDIA PUBLICATIONS SERIES 22 : WEST BENGAL Part I·A General Report Part I-B General Report Part I-C Subsidiary Tables Part II-A General Population Tables Published Part II-A (Supplement) Standard Urban Area Present Volume Part II-B (i) General Economic Tables Published (Tables B·I Part A & B-II) Part U-B (ii) General Economic Tables In Press (Tables B-1 Part B, B-I1I, B·IV, B-VII, B-VIlI Part B, B-IX and Calcutta Urban Agglomeration) Part H-B (iii) General Economic Tables In Press (Tables B-V Part A & B, B-VI Part A (i) & (ii), B-VI Part B (i) & (ii), Calcutta Urban Agglomeration) Part H-C (i) Social & Cultural Tables In Press (Tables C-VII and C-VIlI) Part H-C (ii) Social & Cultural Tables Present Volume (Tables Col to C-VI and Fertility Tables) In Press Part II-D Migration Tables Part III-A Establishments Tables Published Part III-B Report & Subsidiary Tables on Establishments Part IV Housing Report and Tables Published Part V-A Special Tables for Scheduled Castes and In Press Scheduled Tribes Part V-B Ethnographic Notes Part VI-A State Town Directory Part VI-B (i-xv) Special Survey Reports on Selected Towns Part VI-C (i-iii) Survey Reports on Selected Villages Part VIII~A Administration Report on Enumeration Published Part VIII-B Administration Report on Tabulation Part IX Census Atlas Part IX-A Administrative Atlas In Press Part XI (i-v) Special Monographs 1 Published and 1 in Press GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGAL PUBLICATIONS 34 Volumes of District Census Handbooks (Part A & B & C) (15 Volumes ;published) Contents Pages Preface V Introduction to Standard Urban Area VII Table A-V 30 Appendix to Table A-V 30 Maps Standard Urban Area Maps ... 227 PREFACE The Standard Urban Area is a new concept which was developed during the 1971 Census replacing the concept of Town Group of the earlier censuses. It is difined as the "projected growth area" of a city or town as it would be in 1991. The idea is to help study the process of urbanisation by providing, from census to census, comparable data for a predetermined area which is likely to be urbanised during the next two or three decades. The present volume is brought out as a supplement to Part II-A General Population Tables, West Bengal and contains Table A-V and its appendix for the Standard Urban Areas of the State. A map for each of the S. U. A's has also been included. The introductory note attempts to give, in brief, and idea of how the concept of the Standard Urban Area was developed, what has been the pattern of growth of the S. U A's during the last two or three decades and what are the prospects of their future development. I am grateful to the Registrar General, India, the Town and Country Planning Organisation, Government of India and the twon and C. P. Department, Government of West Bengal for the kind help extended to me in delineating the 20 S. U. A's of the State. I must also thank my colleagues in the West Bengal Census Office for their devoted and sincere worl~ in bringing out this publication. I am also thankful to the Manager, Governme nt of India Press, for the expeditious printing of the volume. B. Ghose Director o/Census Operations West Bengal INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION STANDARD URBAN AREA: A NEW CONCEPT The census organization, therefore, felt the need for modifying the concept of town groups for the pur­ The "Standard Urban Area" is a new concept deve­ pose of 1971 census to ensure comparability over loped at the 1971 Census and it connotes teritories space and time. The new concept of "Standard contiguous to an urban core which are likely to be Urban Area" evolved as a result of discussions bet­ urbanised in the next twenty years or so. It may be ween the Registrar General, the Town and Country said to be the projected growth area of a city or town, Planning Organ:zation of the Government of India the urban core, as in 1991. It comprises the towns, and other interested organisations to replace the old and villages which are already or likely to be under concept of Town Groups. the intensive influence of the core town or city and also the intervening areas which are potentially urban. DEFINITION The S. U.A. thus contains all the urbanisable areas centring round the present city or town. It is visua­ As already pointed out, the S.U.A. has been defined lised as the statistic&l reporting unit during three as the projected growth area of a city or town as it successive censuses starting with 1971 which will would be in 1991. It comprises not only the towns increase the comparability of the data obtained at and cities which will get merged into it but also the the different censuses. intervening areas which are potentially urban. "Such a tract will include all extra-municipal urban growth CONCEPT OF TOWN GROUP : NEED FOR CHANGE suchfts suburbs (industria! and residential), railway The concept of "town group" as district from towns coloni~s, civil lines and cantonments and also such of was one of the many new features of the census of the villages and rural areas which are likely to be 1951. Census data were presented on urban areas urbanised by 1991. The S.U.A. will thus be an area for isolated and individual towns and cities and also which will extend beyond the main city or town and for "town groups". This was done with a view to would contain all likely developments over the next identify "a group of towns which adjoined one ano­ 20 years upto 1991," Thus it will remain as a statis­ ther so closely as to form a single inhabited urban tical reporting unit during three successive censuses, locality". The 1961 Census also continued to present irrespective of the changes that may occur in the the data on town groups. But while the 1951 census boundaries of the local administrative units within limited itself to town groups each with an aggregate the tract. The S. U,A. is identified by the adminis­ population of 100,000 and more the 1961 census went trative units that it encompasses, namely, city, town, a step further and the concept was extended to all thana, or village; the boundaries of the S. U.A. are the urban classes and not to the cities of class I only. administrative boundaries of the peripheral units". The "town groups" tried to define well-formed clus­ DELIMITATION OF S.U.A.'S ters to identify the functionally linked urban areas, urban spills beyond the administrative boundaries As in case of all other states, the delimitation of and metropolitan urban conurbations. But, in prac­ S.U.A.'s was an important pre-census task which was tice, varying definitions, different procedures and taken up jointly by the Census organisation, the Town criteria-for delimitation were adopted. Any town and Country Planning Organisation of the Govern­ falling within a radius of 2 to 4, sometimes 5, miles ment of India and its counterpart in the State, that ofthe principal central town or the most populous is, the Town and Country Planning Department of city were included in the group and the intervening the Government of West Bengal. For West Bengal rural areas were all omitted. Thus the town-group the S.U.A.'s were delimited only ""'for {he cities and did not bring out a spatially contiguous tract of urban­ towns whose Ropulations were likely to be 50,000 or rural settlements. Further, the town group concept more by 19711 The following objective considera­ did not effectively tackle the problems involved in tions were applied in demarcating these areas : urban statistical reporting, viz., the problem of muni­ cipal jurisdiction, spill-over growth and the accretion (i) Population growth trends of the main or of population by annexation. These shortcomings were central city or town: Short term migration found to reduce considerably the utility of the concept trends as well as any import~nt locational of town-group as a statistical reportIng unit. decisions that were in the offing and which 1 2 were likely to affect the growth of the town (iv) Speical considerations such as intensity of in the foreseeable future was also to be taken inter-action, strong economic or social linka­ note of; ges etc. which might justify inclusion of any (ii) Trends in the urban spread of the principal other village/town in the vicinity of the main town or city: This involved appreciation city or town: of the extent and directions of urban growth Twenty Standard Urban Areas were demarcated in and the recognition of the physical constrai- . th~ state of West Bengal as listed in Statement I. nts like topography, water bodies, marshes The areas which have been included in the S.U.A.'s etc, to such urban expansion; have been shown in Table A-Vat pages ]82-237 of (iii) The growth of the village and towns on the Part II -A General Population Tables series 22: periphery of the present municipal limits West Bengal. and the prospects of their coalescence in The statment below gives the salient features of the future with the main city; Standard Urban Areas of the State.