THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: That Kerala is straying away from the village concept is scarcely news, and when it comes to metros, Kerala may still have nothing to match Mumbai or New Delhi. Nevertheless, future Kerala could prove to be one unbroken urban spread.Provisional figures on Urban Agglomerations/Cities of Census 2011 show that while Kerala is nowhere near the top in the matter of metro size, it shares the top slot with Uttar Pradesh for having the largest number of urban agglomerations with ten lakh-plus population. Both Kerala and Uttar Pradesh have seven urban agglomerations with more than ten lakh people each. In second place is Maharashtra with six.Census officials define urban agglomerations as ‘a continuous urban spread comprising one or more towns with their adjoining outgrowth(s).’ Ports, university campuses and other known places adjoining cities make up ‘outgrowths.’Kochi tops urban agglomerations in the state with a population of 21.18 lakh followed by Kozhikode, 20.31 lakh. Thrissur (18.55 lakh) and Malappuram (16.99 lakh). Thiruvananthapuram, which has the largest municipal corporation in terms of area, is sixth with a population of 16.87 lakh. Kannur (16.42 lakh) and Kollam (11.10 lakh) lag in the state list. By comparison, the Mumbai urban agglomeration, numero uno at national-level, has a population of 1.84 crore followed by New Delhi - 1.63 crore, followed by Kolkata (1.41 crore). In the south, Chennai tops with 86.9 lakh. Since Kerala towns aren’t distinct entities, standing alone in the midst of rural sprawl unlike in other states, the ballooning in size of urban agglomerations in Kerala is nothing to be amazed at, say Census officials. “Urban agglomerations here have simply merged, increased in size owing to the gradual disappearance of rural areas that lay in between,” said deputy director, Census Operations, Kerala, A N Rajeev.
Comments
0 comment