Housing and transit policy in India suffers from a lack of basic interdisciplinary focus. Few engage across domains, and those who do—mainly economists and certain engineers—tend to undervalue other disciplines, influencing decisions based on a narrow reactionary perspective.

It’s hard to not see xenophobia and elitist NIMBYism even in the most well intentioned anti-tourist sentiment coming from progressives.

Delhi Metro doesn’t report ridership to CAG or in any legal capacity. They only report it to media. That way there is no methodology that CAG has access to.

The usual method is half of the reported ridership is actual ridership. For example the audit in 2019 found that the ridership wasn’t 5.5 million as projected but was half of that. www.hindustantimes.com/cities/delhi...

When discussing Delhi Metro ridership, it's important to clarify whether the reference is to the census or audited ridership, which counts the number of unique riders per day, or to the DMRC's media reported ridership, which often includes duplicate entries & doesn't account for only unique riders.

Property owner NIMBYism and their close ties with judiciary is the biggest factor. Developer NIMBYism happens in the next step.

Almost everyone who owns will want to build. Permits and regulations and the entire corruption and delay involved reduces competition for local developers. Also the biggest local developers know architects & lawyers who can get higher FSI and quick permits

Point was if Prestige wants to expand in Mumbai or Lodha wants to expand in Bangalore, it’s very likely that Prestige with its leverage and connections will prevent Lodha’s entry in Bangalore and vice versa. The developers have a lot of leeway with local bureaucrats vs out of city developers.

Even though NIMBYism is something primarily spoken about in the western context. Opposing it is the very first step in beating nativist xenophobes and protecting migrants in Indian cities. Especially tourist cities NIMBYest xenophobia has gained so much solidarity among Indian progressives.

Would have a very hard time engaging in a world where mainstream western attitude would be to justify India’s treatment of Muslims or support bulldozing Muslim homes as a way to “strengthen” property rights. It’s hard to imagine what Palestinian in particular go through.