There has been a face off situation between the Bangalore Municipal Corporation and the Electronic City, which is a collection of largely non manufacturing industrial units carved out of rural villages and consolidated under one administration. As I understand the situation, the municipality intends to bring Electronic City under its jurisdiction with the intent to collect taxes, but the subdivision is happy remaining autonomous and sees no value in being integrated into Bangalore city.
Their main argument has been their success at planning and managing the subdivision, specially in providing basic amenities that they claim the city has not been able to do too well within its current jurisdiction.
As I rode through Electronic City today, a few things struck me. First, despite large tech firms employing hundreds, there were no vehicles spilling onto the streets. Many complexes had built multistory parking lots to accommodate cars. Coming from Gurgaon where every office complex spouts a chaotic stream of cabs , this was a pleasant surprise. The streets were tree lined and had pavements, another plus. The area was safe. I can vouch for that from the experience of walking from the main road to well inside the city at nearly midnight after taking the last public bus here from the city, on a previous trip.
Does this mean decentralisation works? Is it the way forward? Well, with the huge shift from rural to urban, India should be looking to sprout many new urban areas and in that sense some sort of decentralisation is bound to happen. However this would need its own rules to prevent poor practices like redlining (keeping some groups out), unsustainable approaches and many others. Its certainly worth a thought!