FIRST 20 SMART CITIES IN INDIA

FIRST 20 SMART CITIES IN INDIA

Union Government has declared the names of 98 cities for its ambitious Smart Cities Project.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched Smart Cities Mission, focusing on developing 98 Smart cities by focusing on optimising efficiencies in urban services and infrastructure management, with proactive use of technology and people participation. These 20 smart cities will get the funds first to start their development process. With a per city allocation of Rs 100 crore for each of the five years of the mission period, the central assistance to the mission is around Rs 50,000 crore.The parameters for selection of a city as a smart city was taken are feasibility, result orientation, citizen participation, smartness of proposals etc.

Some of the features of smart cities according to the government website (smartcities.gov.in) are: –

• Promoting mixed land use in area based developments
• Housing and inclusiveness
• Creating walkable localities
• Preserving and developing open spaces
• Promoting a variety of transport options
• Making governance citizen-friendly and cost effective
• Giving an identity to the city
• Applying Smart Solutions to infrastructure and services in area-based development in order to make them better.

Here are few facts on Smart Cities:

• Thirteen of them are in the WHO list of the 20 most polluted cities in the world.
• None of the cities are from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal. On the other hand, some states have two or more nominees – Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh.
• The cities not named today will be asked to get their act together, focus on deficiencies and prepare for Round 2 of announcements in April.
• The prime minister had described Smart Cities as those with “very high quality of life comparable with any developed European city”.