Today, India still remains a rural agricultural country although the
share of urban population has also increased but these figures do not
tell the whole story. There are evidences that urban growth is dispersed
and urban sprawl promotes the spread of urban land use into the
rural-urban fringe.
Here the attempt is to investigate the land transformation and the
driving forces which were influencing the land transformation. The
present study was done on peri urban interface of Aligarh city, a
relatively small city, but as other north Indian cities, it is also
expanding rapidly. Moreover, it too is surrounded by a populous rural
area with productive and rich agricultural hinterland. Such conditions
give rise to many conflicts and mutually beneficial complementarities in
the rural and urban spheres.
The result shows that the demand for land is high which results in
informal urban development fulfilling the requirements of many of the
city's residents. Every piece of land is a tradable commodity, and the
pursuit of short-term profits is the predominant ethic. The actors in
PUI are strong because it is characterized by intermixing of rural and
urban activities and interests as well as the number of actors are
greater than in any other area.
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