Trend is shifting in Favor of NCR

I have spent considerable time of last ten years of my life, in vacillating from one city to other. And frankly speaking I don’t like any metros or Tier -A city. If you ask about my choice of city to live in, I will recommend city like Ahmedabad, Bhubaneswar, Lucknow and Chandigarh. But these cities are still way behind in term of employment opportunities. And that is reason behind metros like Delhi and Mumbai attracting a humongous inflow of migrants.

In my childhood days Mumbai was famous for cricket team, film studios, banking institutions, advertising agencies, manufacturing units in catchment area. Delhi was considered to be city of babus & politicians and was expected to remain a city ,showcasing the glory of Indian history.

In late 90’s the status quo started changing .The states like Haryana & U.P realized the potential of service industry and started developing their areas in proximity of Delhi ,and that gave birth to a phenomena called NCR.Who had imagined that the states predominantly known for their agriculture based economy will become the favored destination for outsourcing.

Relatively low cost of setting up an industry also boosted the fortune of these areas. In future, we will witness more and more financial institutions shifting to Gugaon, more IT companies opening their corporate offices in Gurgaon and Noida, more manufacturing units in Sonipat, Faridabad and Sahibabad.

Since, I am marketer by profession; I have deep interest in Advertising and Media. During my college days I used to think that “if I want to give myself a bigger canvas”, my destination should be Mumbai. But if we rely on an article recently published in ET-Brand Equity, almost all big names like O&M, Rediffusion, Dentsu or Wizcraft are doing their considerable business from NCR region.

We can easily spot the studios of news channels in Noida and Gurgaon. I cross three such studios, in my way to office, and that too in distance of two km only. The rising regionalism(against north Indians) in Mumbai and gradually increasing clout of regional movies (Bhojpuri &Punjabi)will eventually result in more and more film studios in Noida and Gurgaon.

In the last but not least ,I have firm believe that richer cities always do better in cricket and Delhi Daredevils has outperformed Mumbai Indians in last two version of IPL (the modern cricket).Evem U.P and Punjab are doing reasonably well in domestic cricket, in recent time.

Even though it is too early to predict, but there are clear indication that trend is shifting in favor of NCR.