Smart city guidelines are in an advanced stage of finalisation after which cities where the project are to be implemented would be selected, Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said.
Replying to supplementaries, he told the Rajya Sabha that there was “no agreement with regard to any financial committment between India and USA” regarding the Smart Cities Mission as the US role was limited to extending technical support and for capacity building.
Regarding India-US Cooperation in making Visakhapatnam, Allahabad and Ajmer as Smart Cities, he said that the US will extend technical support for preparing Master Plans for these three cities besides assisting in capacity building and undertaking feasibility studies.
The United States Trade Development Agency (USTDA) has signed MoUs with the states of Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan in this regard.
“The Smart Cities Guidelines are under formulation stage; which will contain the criteria… Guidelines are under advanced stage of finalization. Any time it can be finalized.
“The selection of cities will be made after the guidelines are finalized. We are in the process of issuing
guidelines,” Naidu said.
Smart City aspirants will be selected based on a ‘City Challenge Competition’. Cities will be graded based on their revenues, expenditure, availability of infrastructure relating to transport, drinking water, solid waste management etc.
Naidu said the Smart Cities Mission involved an ‘area based approach’ and it is meant to set examples that can be replicated both within and outside the Smart City.
Observing that the Mission was expected to catalyse creation of similar Smart Cities in various regions and parts of the country, he said every state would get to develop at least one city as Smart City under the Centre’s initiative of developing 100 such cities.
“Every state will be given the needed importance and will have the benefit of selecting some cities,” Naidu said.
His response came in reply to supplementaries as to why Himalayan states like Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh and those in North Eastern Region will be able to compete with other cities to fulfill the norms to qualify for the smart city project.
The Union Cabinet accorded approval for the Smart Cities Mission last week and guidelines for its implementation including the criteria for selection of cities are being finalised.
The concept of Smart City has been broadly defined as “one (City) having provision of basic infrastructure to give a decent quality of life to its citizens, a clean and sustainable environment and application of Smart Solutions, keeping citizens at the centre”.
