Abstract

Chaos, irrelevance, incompetence and exclusion, what do these “failures” tell us about the apparently self-evident understandings of plans, “planning” and “planned development” in Delhi? What implications does this have, in particular, for an urban politics and practice interested in the many forms and imaginations of a just and more equitable city? This paper argues that in Delhi the “chaos that is urban development” is not planned but is an outcome of planning. Plans do not control but they influence, determine and limit.