Properties of Rent: Capital, Community, and Politics in Globalizing Delhi

CASI Seminar

in partnership with the South Asia Center, Christopher H. Browne Center for International Politics, and the Dept. of Political Science

Sushmita Pati
Assistant Professor of Political Science, National Law School of India University, Bangalore
A Virtual CASI Seminar via Zoom — 12 noon EST | 10:30pm IST




(English captions & Hindi subtitles available)

About the Seminar:
We live in cities whose borders have always been subject to expansion. What does such transformation of rural spaces mean for cities and vice-versa? This seminar revolves around the social history of villages around Delhi that were brought into the urban fray in the 1950s and 1960s. Designated as "urban villages," these spaces evolve along with the city but continue to exhibit the contradictions of being both "rural" and "urban." As these villages transform physically, their residents, an agrarian-pastoralist community (the Jats), also transform into dabblers in real estate post 1990s. Through this social history emerges a very different trajectory of accumulation—one that overlaps with the trajectory of the story of capital, but isn't entirely that—the trajectory of rent. The logic of rent allows for close control over urban property and allows for a vernacular form of accumulation led by a community. The social history of these villages is also a social history of rent, which operates differently and sometimes in opposition to the logic of capital.

About the Speaker:
Sushmita Pati is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at National Law School of India University, Bangalore. She studied at Jawaharlal Nehru University and Delhi University. Her research interests lie at the intersections of urban politics and political economy. She is the author of Properties of Rent: Capital, Community and Politics in Globalising Delhi (Cambridge University Press, 2022). Her writings have appeared across social science journals as well as popular media platforms.

The Nand & Jeet Khemka Distinguished Lecture Series is an endowed public program of the Center for the Advanced Study of India (CASI). Launched in the 2007-08 academic year, and made possible through the generous support of the Nand & Jeet Khemka Foundation, the series brings renowned India specialists to the Penn community and serves as a critical forum for analyzing and understanding the complex economic, political, social, and cultural changes that the world’s largest democracy is experiencing, as well as the challenges that lie ahead.
The Saluja Global Fellows Program has been made possible by the generous gift from Vishal Saluja ENG’89 W’89. CASI was excited to launch the program during the 2022–23 academic year, coinciding with the Center’s 30th Anniversary. This new program enables CASI to invite eminent leaders and rising experts on contemporary India preferably from the fields of media, culture, law, and contemporary history to be in residence for one to two weeks at CASI.