An annual survey of Indian cities shows that a majority of local governments are financially dependent on their State governments. They also have limited control over who to hire and how to distribute work. The report found that only Assam empowers its city governments to collect all key taxes. Except five States — Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, Meghalaya, and Rajasthan — all the others have to get approval from the State before borrowing money.
The report, Annual Survey of India’s City-Systems (ASICS) 2023, was published by the Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy, a non-profit institution.
Table 1 | The table shows the asymmetry of the mayor/council powers across various city categories.
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Table 1 shows this asymmetry of power across four city categories — megacities (>4 million (mn) population), large cities (1-4 mn), medium cities (0.5 mn-1 mn), small cities (<0.5 mn). It shows that while megacities have more of a say over their finances, their mayors do not have a five-year tenure and are not directly elected. On the other hand, more mayors in smaller cities have a five-year tenure and are directly elected, but…
