The future of cities is one in which cities don't exist. They will be blown apart by the changes currently taking place. Cities have begun to feel the forces of change spawned by new technologies. As the internet grows in popularity as a way to shop and carry on business, this could have dramatic results. The new technologies have already made it easier for some businesses to relocate outside cities-drawing many workers with them.

As shopping and working online become mainstream, people may feel less inclined to travel to crowded business districts. We are already seeing some routine workers, especially part-time workers, working entirely from home or neighbourhood workstations. All this may lead to a universal scattering of millions of villages, giving individuals locally the comforts of village-scale life and electronically the cultural richness of great cities.

Technology notwithstanding, cities offer services and advantages that will continue to draw people. Whatever the future may hold, today's cities are in trouble now. And no solution is in sight for the massive problems of housing and sanitation for the growing millions of urban poor. Nor has anyone come close to finding a means to eliminate crime, environmental decay, or urban pollution.

Just how fast are cities growing? Some estimate that people are flocking to cities at the staggering rate of more than a million a week. In developing lands more than 200 cities now have populations that pass the million mark. Some 20 have reached the ten million mark. And no slowdown is in sight. The massive inflow of people often leads to high levels of unemployment and underemployment because the market for labour may be unable to absorb the expanding number of job seekers. Poverty can lead to crime. Large populations also strain a city's ability to provide such basic services as water and sanitation. Not to be overlooked either is the devastating effect overpopulation often has on the local environment. Nearby farmlands disappear as city boundaries expand.

Some would argue that governments should simply funnel more money into their cities. But given the track record that many governments, solving the problems of cities is not as simple as writing out a check. Cities are made up of people, not just buildings and streets. So, it is people who must change if city life is to improve. The best economy of a city is the care and culture of its people. And if drug abuse, prostitution, pollution, environmental decay, social inequality, vandalism, graffiti, and the like are to be eliminated, more is required than an increased police presence or a fresh coat of paint. People must be helped to make dramatic changes in their thinking and behaviour.

Effecting such change is beyond the capability of humans. So attempts to solve the problems of today's cities-no matter how well-intentioned they are-will ultimately fail. Students of the Bible do not despair, however, for they see today's urban difficulties as just one more example of man's inability to manage our planet properly.

Chronicles Of Growth Foretold

Mohali: Chandigarh's new sibling

Hyderabad: Can it keep up its reputation?

Pune: Now more than Mumbai's distant cousin

Pune. Chandigarh. Hyderabad. A decade ago dynamic was a word that wasn't associated with these cities. Somnolent, is more like it. Nothing really happened here. Yet, there are today India's new breed of cities. What drives people here?

Pune, now at one end of a six-lane expressway, is poised to become an extended but more sophisticated and infinitely cheaper suburb of Mumbai. The flash without the cash. Chandigarh, a boring (it still is) government town is shaking off its stupor to throw up tony clones like Mohali. With its wide, green spaces, and new non-polluting industries, it a magnet to the northern professional. Hyderabad isn't new, but its attitude is. Cleaned up, the great mall of Hyderabad boasts of some of India's best shopping and job opportunities. Much of Hyderabad's present has to do with its past: apart from its energy, its reputation as an emerging tech-centre is connected to the myriad government-run research establishments dotting the city. Previously, these institutions were disconnected from the private sector. But the coming of the infotech and biotech revolutions have placed them in a symbiotic relationship.

With the white-collar job opportunities, are coming the engines of growth-shopping malls, apartment complexes, the demand for cleaner cities where the administration works. Chandigarh and Hyderabad are showcases of what will happen in India's cities of the future. As the population gains a voluble middle and upper class, governments will have no choice but respond to demands of a better, brighter city.

-Suveen K. Sinha