Town Planning:With Some Reference to Calcutta

My friends have asked me to read a paper on "Town-Planning." I seriously doubt if I am properly qualified for the task but they have a notion that I am. The audience to-night would, I am sure, be the better Judge of that. Probably this notion comes from the fact that I have been employed for a number of years in fairly responsible positions first in the Calcutta Corporation and now in the Calcutta Improvement Trust, two of the biggest and most important bodies of the kind in India. Obviously, much of what I have to say is the result of my experience in these two bodies yet I would like to make it quite clear at the outset that whatever I say here should be taken as my personal opinion and should in no way be construed as the official views or policy of either of these bodies, particularly the latter.