The biggest contribution that Khansaheb made was to correct our distorted perception of the poor. On the other hand, Khansaheb taught us, through his lifelong work, that the true poverty of the poor arises not out of lack of money but out of constant disempowerment. In other words, it is not economic poverty that keeps the poor poor, but it is their political poverty. What the poor need is empowerment in the form of some technical knowledge, maybe some catalytic financial support, but, most of all, institutions which give them the right to decide on all those issues that affect their own lives. But this means that the so-called educated must learn to respect the poor and develop a firm belief in their capacity to manage themselves.
Urban management is in a state of crisis across the developing world.
Our towns and cities are today cesspools of filth and pollution, and becoming worse by the day. This is in the very nature of Western-style urbanisation which presents poor countries with two key problems. This sharp disparity can be seen in any South Asian city today. Two, Western urbanisation is extremely material-intensive, which means it draws in enormous materials from the hinterland leading to an intense ecological pressure on it, and then it generates enormous quantities of wastes and pollutants, making urban life a living hell. Over the last 25 years, there have emerged several outstanding efforts in the rural areas of India where villagers have got together to manage their degraded natural resource base and undertake cooperative measures to restore it, which in turn has changed their economic landscape as well.