Chandigarh: Chandigarh, the “City Beautiful”, widely considered among India’s most liveable places, presents a paradoxical picture of striking affluence alongside persistent administrative and security concerns, as reflected in several official surveys and assessments.Its planned layout, tree-lined boulevards, robust infrastructure and civic discipline offer a standard of urban life few Indian metros can match, even as this framework remains hampered by bureaucratic bottlenecks in governance and regulatory processes and by emerging concerns over rising crime and suicides.And, as the Union Territory of Chandigarh, which also serves as the shared capital of Punjab and Haryana, marks the diamond jubilee of its founding in 1951, data from the latest 2023–24 National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) point to higher-than-average consumption of food, water and electricity among city residents, compared with national averages.The NSSO, which undertakes large-scale socio-economic household surveys, revealed that Chandigarh’s average household daily caloric intake – at 2,712 kilocalories (kcal) in urban areas and 2,410 kcal in its rural belt – is significantly higher than the national medians of 2,240 and 2,212 kcal, respectively. Both statistics are also higher than those of the neighbouring agrarian states of Punjab and Haryana.Daily water availability of 252 litres per person is likewise well above the national benchmark of 135 litres, while monthly milk consumption of 14.2 litres per capita exceeds both national and regional levels. Electricity usage reflects the same pattern of affluence, with annual per capita consumption reaching around 1,702 kWh in 2023–24, driven by dense urban demand and widespread appliance penetration.The City Beautiful also enjoys higher income levels and substantial vehicle ownership compared with much of the country, reflecting a distinctly consumption-heavy economy. It presently has more vehicles than people – 14.27 lakh for a population of 13 lakh – with more cars registered in recent years than motorised two-wheelers, underscoring the extent to which private transport has become a defining feature of the city’s daily existence.Moreover, Chandigarh’s rapid shift towards cleaner mobility is evident in its 12% electric vehicle penetration in 2025–26 – the third highest in India after Tripura (16.9%) and Assam (14.3%). It also topped NITI Aayog’s transport electrification index with a score above 90, more than three times the national average of 37.But beneath this seemingly utopian image lies an underside that dents the city’s burnished reputation, centred on concerns over law and order.In recent years, the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) has recorded a rise in serious offences in Chandigarh, including murder, rape, kidnapping, dowry deaths, theft and cyber fraud – many involving senior citizens. The latest NCRB data for 2024 reveals that Chandigarh has the second-highest crime rate among UTs, at 290.4 cases per lakh population, above the national average of 237.4. Crimes against women also rose to 452 cases, including 96 rapes, while suicide rates have likewise burgeoned, adding another layer of concern that contrasts with the city’s carefully curated image of order and urban calm.Adding to these concerns, Chandigarh continues to grapple with bureaucratic friction and red tape, slowing approvals and regulatory processes, while NITI Aayog’s ease-of-doing-business assessment places it in the “jump-start needed” category.Taken together, these trends point to a city that is materially prosperous and visually ordered, yet increasingly shaped by the strains of rapid urban affluence – where governance capacity, social pressures and security challenges are beginning to test the limits of its planned and modernist framework.Statues of women inside the Rock Garden at Chandigarh. Credit: Abhijeet Rane from Hildesheim, Germany, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.But for someone who moved to Chandigarh from Shimla a year after its founding in 1952, left in his teens and over a decade ago began returning regularly for extended stays – drawn back as an environmental refugee from polluted, traffic-choked and chaotic New Delhi – the City Beautiful’s appeal lies not only in its strong performance across key official indicators, but in its lived reality.Much of this overwhelming sense of urban order and harmonious design is rooted in Chandigarh’s physical planning, one of the 20th century’s few purpose-built cities, alongside Brasília in Brazil and, later, Islamabad. Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier’s grid of sectors continues to define its planning logic, with each neighbourhood functioning as a self-contained unit with its own markets and ample parks.The city’s broad, avenue-like roads keep traffic relatively manageable, while well-apportioned bungalows with generous gardens, carefully maintained pavements and plentiful parking reinforce a sense of order in a thoughtfully planned urban space that is hard, if not impossible, to find elsewhere in India.This spatial order is reinforced by abundant greenery – tree-lined roads that make everyday movement more pleasant. Moreover, expansive green spaces, vast forested tracts – some populated by nilgai – a butterfly park and other open, easily accessible areas together create a pervasive and rare sense of serenity.Chandigarh also boasts an extensive and continually expanding network of over 120 km of cycling tracks – now extending across the adjoining towns of Panchkula and Mohali to nearly 300 km – making it possible for residents to cycle to work, school, or markets with ease. Well-illuminated and lined on both sides with towering trees that form a cool canopy in summer, these tracks create a safe, unhurried environment where distances remain manageable and daily life unfolds at a more measured pace.In fact, so embedded is Chandigarh’s cycling culture – unmatched by any other Indian city – that these tracks remain almost entirely free of motorised two-wheelers, with the few that do stray onto them, retreating shamefacedly when challenged. This ingrained discipline, built over 75 years, has also sustained an oft-repeated local belief that Le Corbusier envisioned Chandigarh’s transport grid around the bicycle’s two wheels.Consequently, it’s possible to traverse long distances across the tri-city area simply by staying within these cycling corridors, with the added dividend of gliding superciliously past traffic snarls. Beyond this, an 8–10 km ride from the city centre in most directions transports cyclists into expansive wheat, paddy, or sugarcane fields, depending on the season and during winter past roadside gur (jaggery)-making kilns, where the sweet, smoky aroma of boiling cane juice wafts across the countryside.This ease of outdoor movement is further reinforced by Chandigarh’s comparatively cleaner air. The city’s air quality index (AQI) is significantly lower than Delhi’s, where in successive winters it has often risen to 10–12 times the recommended global safety limit. During winter, blue skies over Delhi are a rarity, becoming a subject of animated discussion whenever they do appear. In contrast, Chandigarh’s winter skies, just 250 kilometres to the north, are typically clear and blue, with bright sunshine and crisp, bracing air.Beyond this glaring environmental contrast, the city’s public infrastructure is maintained with notable efficiency: roads, roundabouts, cycle tracks and public buildings are repaired relatively quickly, illegal constructions are swiftly removed and traffic police remain consistently vigilant and comparatively free of graft.The city, however, is not without systemic flaws, but there remains a lingering impression that, being a Union Territory, it is better monitored and more tightly regulated through a combination of modern surveillance systems and an enduring civic discipline rooted in its founding ethos of restraint, order and quiet elegance. Indeed, it is this combination of structure and liveability that has shaped wider perceptions of the city as relatively exceptional – so much so that in 2015 the BBC described Chandigarh as the world’s most “perfect city”, citing its monumental architecture, grid of self-contained neighbourhoods and abundant greenery.This reputation has also prompted many older Chandigarh residents to jest that the city remains, in effect, under the quiet supervision of Corbusier’s ghost, still reviewing his master plan from beyond, but now aided by an ever-watchful network of CCTV cameras and smartphone-wielding residents who ensure that little escapes public notice for long.Meanwhile, some commentators like local public policy scholar Pramod Kumar have critiqued Chandigarh for being an elitist city, with an evident geographical divide between its affluent planned sectors and the peripheral areas inhabited by lower-income and service communities. In his February 19 essay, Chandigarh at 75: A Tale of Two Cities, in The Indian Express, he contends that the city’s administrative machinery and affluent housing are concentrated in its upmarket sectors, while the workers and support classes who sustain it have, over time, been pushed to the periphery, creating two uneven urban realities within a single city.Migrant workers on their way to board a train to reach their native villages, during the COVID-19 lockdown, in Chandigarh, May 31, 2020. Photo: PTI.While such an assessment may not be entirely inaccurate, NSSO and other NITI Aayog indicators clearly indicate Chandigarh’s relatively high level of liveability, suggesting that despite these structural critiques, the city still delivers a tangible baseline of comfort and efficiency for most of its residents. This translates into an urban environment that functions with a degree of predictability and ease, where existing gaps, while real, do not overwhelm the broader experience of order and functionality.However, at a broader civic level, Chandigarh – conceived after Partition as Punjab’s replacement for Lahore and envisioned as a calm, controlled experiment in order and restraint – has developed a vibrant public life of its own. This unfolds daily across streets, private homes, malls, clubs, breweries, eateries and the so-called ‘gedi’ circuits of youth cruising. Against this backdrop, the city’s austere, monolithic architecture still appears to follow its original blueprint, but its more flamboyant, nouveau riche milieu moves to a decidedly more raucous rhythm.Chandigarh’s affluent circles are split largely between “kakas” and “kakis” – affluent, privileged and indulgent young men and women drawn to fast cars, alcohol, drugs, gyms and constant online visibility – and the older “gush-meets” and “gush-veers”, or equally performative club-going and drawing-room regulars, who move through social circuits with ease and mutual gushing and flattery.For both groups, life is relentlessly staged and broadcast feverishly on social media platforms. And, beneath much of this online theatre lies a conspicuous culture of swagger, loud self-display and conspicuous affluence, masking an overwhelming sense of vacuousness beneath its affluent veneer.The former, for their part, drift through the city with easy confidence, blending inherited privilege with gym workouts, golf rounds and brunches during the day and their nights in breweries and curated hangouts, where being seen matters most. Conversely, the latter operate in an equally self-conscious manner, inhabiting house gatherings, drawing rooms and elaborate lawns and balconies, where conversation is rarely demanding, approval being generously dispensed and obviously phoney compliments are routine.Alongside them sit Chandigarh’s older institutional classes – retired and serving bureaucrats and military officers, mostly army veterans who still lend the city its gravitas. But even here, the tone has shifted in recent years, towards nostalgia and earlier “better times,” as if the present is something they merely inhabit, rather than fully engage.Adding to this societal menagerie are agrarian elites from Punjab and Haryana – flush with cash and political connections – whose presence is marked by visibility and scale: bigger cars, bigger homes and a penchant for conspicuous flaunting. And, then there are the seasonal NRIs, arriving at the start of each winter with nostalgia, greenbacks and constant comparisons to “back home,” briefly stirring the social landscape before departing with the conviction of having added a layer of global polish to a city that largely carries on unchanged.In conclusion, none of this points to a decline in Chandigarh’s physical or urban form; it simply shows how the city is now used and lived in by changing social groups. But despite this churn and visible excess, it remains cleaner, calmer and more functional than most Indian cities. The order may have changed in style – less about restraint, more about spectacle – but underneath it all, Chandigarh still works well, remaining one of India’s most liveable urban spaces.