Class 6 Civics

Urban Administration NCERT Exercise Solution

Question 1: Why did the children go to Yasmin Khala's house?

Answer: The children were curious to know who was responsible for fixing the streetlights. Yasmin Khala was working for the municipality. Hence, one child’s mother advised them to go to Yasmin Khala. She thought that Yasmin Khala would be the best person to answer their questions.

Question 2: List four ways in which the work of the Municipal Corporation affects the life of a city-dweller.

Answer: Following are the four ways in which the work of the Municipal Corporation affects the life of a city-dweller:

  1. By keeping the drainage clean, it keeps the city clean.
  2. By collecting and disposing off the garbage, it maintains cleanliness on streets.
  3. By providing parks, it provides open space to people.
  4. By working on malaria and dengue prevention, it helps the health of the people.

Question 3: Who is a Municipal Councillor?

Answer: The person who is elected by the people of a ward is called the municipal councilor or ward councilor.

Question 4: What did Gangabai do and why?

Answer: Gangabai was not happy because there was no regular cleaning of streets in her locality. So, she took a group of women and protested in front of the Chairman’s office.

Question 5: How does the Municipal Corporation earn the money to do its work?

Answer: The Municipal Corporation collects taxes on houses, water, entertainment, parking, etc. to earn money. It also gets some grant from the government.

Discuss: Question 6: In the two photographs you see different ways of collecting and disposing garbage.

garbage collector garbage collector

Image REF: NCERT Book

  1. Which way do you think provides safety to the person disposing garbage?

    Answer: The second photograph shows the safe way of disposing garbage.
  2. What are the dangers of collecting garbage in the manner shown in the first photograph?

    Answer: In the first photograph, the worker may get injured. He may get infected and may fall sick.
  3. Why do you think that proper ways of disposing garbage are not available to those who work in municipalities?

    Answer: This can be because of two reasons. First reason is lack of fund to buy proper equipments. The second reason is lack of awareness among workers as well as among the officers.

Question 7: Several poor people in the city work as domestic servants as well as work for the Corporation, keeping the city clean. Yet the slums in which they live are quite filthy. This is because these slums seldom have any water and sanitation facilities. The reason often given by the Municipal Corporation is that the land in which the poor have set up their homes does not belong to them and that slum-dwellers do not pay taxes. However people living in middle class neighbourhoods pay very little in taxes compared to the amount of money the corporation spends on them in setting up parks, street lighting facilities, regular garbage collection etc. Also as you read in this chapter, the property taxes collected by the Municipality makes up only 25-30 per cent of its money. Why do you think it is important that the Corporation should spend more money on slum localities? Why is it important that the Municipal Corporation provide the poor in the city with the same facilities that the rich get?

Answer: Slums are also integral part of a city. The slum dwellers contribute immensely. They provide various services to the middle class people. Moreover, if an epidemic spreads in a slum it will also affect the middle class locality. So maintenance of cleanliness in slums is as important as in middle class locality.

EXTRA QUESTIONS

Question 1: Which civic body provides civic amenities in a city?

Answer: Municipality

Question 2: What is the difference between Municipal Council and Municipal Corporation?

Answer: The municipality in a small town is called the Municipal Council and that in a big city is called the Municipal Corporation.

Question 3: What do you understand by Councilors’ Committees?

Answer: Different committees are formed to look after planning and implementation of various programmes. These committees have councilors as their members. A particular committee takes decision about a particular aspect.

Question 4: What are the various functions of the municipality?

Answer: Water supply, hospitals, roads, street lighting, drainage, fire brigade, market places, records of births and deaths, solid waste management, etc. are the functions of the municipality.