On the first day of November this year, Bangalore celebrated Karnataka Rajyotsava, the anniversary of the formation of the state of Karnataka. Every year, the day is occasion for supra-chauvinists to bemoan the fact that the state's indigenous residents, the Kannadigas, are a minority in Bangalore. Some years, shop signs that are in English are daubed over with black paint by extremist elements of Kannada-organisations. This year, even the moderates signalled their unhappiness at the state of the city. "A mere 27 per cent of Bangaloreans are Kannadigas," says G. Narayan, a former mayor of Bangalore, and a former President of the Kannada Development Authority, an organisation that seeks to promote the Kannada language. "It is a tragedy that in the name of development, Kannadigas are being deprived of their rightful share."

The impending social fracture implied by Narayana is something Bangalore, a city of 7.2 million that stakes claim to being Asia's Silicon Valley, can ill afford. The city is already dying. That's right, you read it right the first time. Your city, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Pune, even Gurgaon, is dying. Its arteries are choked with traffic, lungs corroded by pollutants, throat parched with thirst, and body labouring under a weight its heart cannot sustain.

New Delhi and Mumbai, the nation's political and commercial capitals, players in an all-too-Indian version of The Tale of Two Cities, the two largest cities in the country, cannot die. Kolkata, once the capital of British India, died in the 1990s and discovered an after-life involving a modicum of business, a mini real-estate boom-the huge out-of-Kolkata Bengali diaspora believes in buying a piece of condominium-paradise back home-and a full-fledged retail boom, attributable, in part, to Bangladesh's rich. No one, apart from the Government of Gujarat, talks of Ahmedabad any longer as a serious centre of business although this may have more to do with perception than fact. If you live in any of the other notable Indian cities, especially ones that are at the forefront of the economic boom the country finds itself in, however, we have news for you. Your city is dying. Victims of their own ability to attract investments, create jobs, and become dream-destinations for young professionals with dollar dreams in their eyes, they are, slowly but surely, choking. As Bob Hoekstra, the indophile CEO of Bangalore-based Philips Software who has just signalled his company's unwillingness to participate in it.com, a state government sponsored jamboree targeted at positioning Karnataka, and Bangalore, as the destination for it companies, puts it: "It is not right to attract more companies when the city does not have adequate infrastructure for the existing ones."

That's a problem that finds an echo across India's booming cities. If it isn't bad roads, it is power. And if the pollution does not get you, the lack of water sure will. "There is a perpetual shortage of 20-30 mw and the power goes off for three to four hours every day," complains A.H. Firodia, Chairman, Kinetic Engineering, a Pune-based two-wheeler manufacturer. "Growing traffic and pollution are a source of concern, and many times we have to think twice before venturing out," says B. Ramalinga Raju, Chairman of the Hyderabad-based Satyam Computer Services, one of India's largest software services firms. "There is adequate security inside the apartment-complexes (where we live)," says Arun Tadanki, CEO, Monster India, a jobs site, and the resident of an up-market condominium in Gurgaon, "but I would think twice before stepping out at night."

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Underlying such sentiments is growth. Pune, a favoured destination for software and automotive companies, is hot with the first growing by 40 per cent a year and the second, 20 per cent. As is Chennai, which has suddenly emerged a worthy rival to Bangalore. And Gurgaon expects to see the addition of some 3 million sq. ft. of office space and 5,000 apartments to its already crowded topography over the next two years.

More people, more cars, more houses, and more service establishments (restaurants, hotels, malls) may help a city's economy in the short term, but in the absence of adequate planning, it could result in a collapse of civic machinery. That's only the beginning. Over time, it could result in the destruction of the social and economic fabric of the entire region surrounding the city. "Look at the village of Bavdhan," gestures Aneeta Beeninger, Director, Centre for Development Studies and Activities, Pune, from her office atop a hill overlooking the village. Bavdhan is a village recently annexed by a city on overdrive; the construction activity has already eaten away most of the hillside in clear violation of regulations. Bangalore's Commisioner of Police S. Mariswamy rues that he has a mere 2,800 traffic policemen to oversee a city of 17 lakh vehicles and seven million people. And B.P. Acharya, Managing Director of the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board, admits that "this year has been particularly bad with a 30 per cent to 40 per cent deficit in the catchment areas".

Worse, the wealth factor has resulted in an immigrant boom: with business booming, people are earning more than ever before, and apart from investing in homes, cars and consumer durables, also looking to improve the quality of their lives by hiring more servants, thereby attracting unskilled labour by the droves to these cities. The result is an increase in the number and size of slums, even total collapse of the law and order machinery and basic civic amenities in certain parts of these cities. Money, or the lack of it, cannot really be an excuse. "I would think all major developers would have thus far contributed just under Rs 1,000 crore to the Haryana Government in the form of external development charges (EDC)," says Sanjay Chandra, Director, Unitech, a real-estate developer. The question hidden in his statement: what has happened to the money? In response, Dinesh Chauhan, District Town Planner, Haryana Urban Development Authority, claims private developers are responsible for the mess that is Gurgaon by "expanding faster than the city administration can cope". Just how bad is the problem? "Gurgaon cannot treat more than 20 per cent of the sewage it generates and can barely meet 50 per cent of peak power demand," explains a senior executive at another real-estate development firm.

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Today, none of the five cities in question can claim to have an integrated approach to urban planning. Sharad Mahajan, a town-planner and architect who works with Mashal, a Pune-based non governmental organisation that works in the area of environmental conservation, points out that Pune has not had a town-planning exercise since 1970. All development since, he adds, has been through instruments such as Transfer of Development Rights and Accomodation Reservation, tools that facilitate ad hoc acquisition of land.

It is fairly easy to predict the long-term impact of the absence of an organised approach to urban planning. In Guragon's case, for instance, says Patu Keswani, the CEO of Krizm Hotels (he has just opened a budget hotel, Lemon Tree, in the city) "the more labour intensive industries will move to Manesar," a town a few kilometres down the Delhi-Jaipur road from Gurgaon. And in Bangalore's case, Wipro Chairman Azim Premji has already said the bulk of his company's growth (in people terms) will be outside the city.

There is an even more important aspect to urban planning: it has to be inclusive and cannot ignore the interests of those people whose lives will be touched by the growth of the city. The Karnataka Government did so and farmers in the village of Belandur near Bangalore have taken it to court over the acquisition of land for an IT Corridor. "Why should the state government forcibly acquire our agricultural land that has been handed down from generation to generation?" asks Bargur Muniyappa, a farmer. "Neither we nor our children will benefit from all this computer stuff."

-Reported by Venkatesha Babu, Bangalore, Kushan Mitra, Delhi, E. Kumar Sharma, Hyderabad, Priya Srinivasan, Mumbai, and Nitya Varadarajan, Chennai