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Synopsis The past five decades have witnessed a phenomenal growth of urban population in India. Increased urbanisation is accompanied by severe environmental problems, which adversely affect the quality of life of the people. The major urban concern is the growing gap between the demand and supply of basic infrastructure services. The present state of affairs, of subsidized free services, needs to change and the cost of services including production, distribution debt servicing and operation and maintenance, have to be recovered from the beneficiaries. In the present book, an attempt has been made on the issues of Urban Infrastructure Development in urban towns. The book has been divided in several chapters, such as: (1) Challenges of Urban Local Government in Developed & Developing Countries with special reference to India, wherein the issues relating to local self-government have been discussed in detail; (2) The chapter on Urban Management including 74th Amendment pertains to management of urban areas and issues thereof have been detailed out with an emphasis on CAA; (3) the chapter on Integrated Development of Small & Medium towns relates to the IDSMT Scheme in detail, from its inception and its impact; (4) Infrastructure: A Theoretical Perspective chapter gives the history about the past details of the infrastructure; (5) In the chapter Existing Urban Infrastructure of Small and Medium Towns, details of the available infrastructure have been discussed and what is further required; (6) The chapter Urban Infrastructure Development in Local Government for 21st century relates to the requirements of infrastructure and the future needs; (7) Financing of Urban Local Government chapter details out the funds required including the existing money available; and finally, (8) Privatization of Urban Services pertains to lease out the services by the urban local bodies to private hands for efficiency and savings. The author has tried to deal with existing, emerging and future problems faced by urban local bodies with regard to infrastructure and have come out with constructive-suggestions, which need to be attended to. The research methodology is based on study of literature, personal visits to a large number of local bodies, research studies conducted by the author and personal experience as a citizen. The author has also acted as city administrator for executive development of the towns and has understood the problems relating to urban infrastructure of urban local bodies. Such opportunities provided intimate relationships, which led to know the real issues faced by urban local bodies on this account. The chapters are supplemented with charts, tables, graphs and case studies to make the reading interesting and comprehensible. A special feature of this book is that it deals with the Urban Infrastructure issues, which it engages itself in emerging areas like Existing Infrastructure. Urban Management, Privatization of Urban Services, in the urban local bodies. The book provides concrete suggestions and does not merely describe the urban phenomenon. It is hoped that this book would be useful to the scholars of urban local self-government and especially to those who are engaged in planning, policy-making and decision-making about urban local bodies for Infrastructure Development.