Smart Cities Mission

A Parliamentary Committee has noted contrasting differences in the completion of targets in different cities under the flagship 'Smart City Mission' (SCM)

Agra, Varanasi, Chennai, Pune and Ahmedabad are among the 22 cities that will complete all projects under the government's ambitious Smart Cities Mission by next month, giving their citizens better quality of life and a clean and sustainable environment, officials said on Sunday. In the remaining 78 cities selected under the mission, the ongoing projects will be completed in the next three-four months, a senior official of the Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry said. The Narendra Modi government launched its flagship Smart Cities Mission on June 25, 2015 and 100 cities were selected for redevelopment through four rounds of competition from January 2016 to June 2018. According to the ministry, the mission's objective is to promote cities that provide core infrastructure and give its citizens a decent quality of life and a clean and sustainable environment, besides adopting "smart solutions" to various issues. The 22 smart cities where all projects will be completed by March ar

In a major boost to the Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban), the Centre on Wednesday announced a 150-per cent hike in the outlay of its flagship scheme with an allocation of Rs 5,000 crore in the Union Budget 2023-24. However, there has been a nine-per cent decrease, with an allocation of Rs 2,132 crore, for the construction of non-residential office buildings, including the Central Vista project, Parliament and Supreme Court, as compared to the revised estimates of Rs 2,344.08 crore in the last fiscal. On October 1, 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched the second phase of the Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban), which envisions making all cities in the country "garbage-free". In the 2022-23 revised estimates, the SBM(U) was allocated Rs 2,000 crore. The Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry, which has been implementing the SBM(U) and the Central Vista redevelopment project, was allocated Rs 76,431.6 crore in the budget. According to the budget presented by Finance Minister Nirm

The success of the smart city mission depends on urban local bodies, and it is imperative to carve out a bigger role for them in the national development strategies

Varanasi had the highest completion rate of 87.1 per cent among all the cities.

It is true that in the last seven-eight years, there has been a build-up of unsold inventory of apartments in several cities

The official said all the 100 smart cities selected under the mission will now have to complete their projects by June 2023

An analysis reveals that just about a fourth of the funds allocated for smart cities have been spent, even though nearly half of the projects have been completed

Smart cities were envisioned to be a solution to waste management, air pollution, traffic congestion, scarce resources and more.

GIS, which is designed to capture, analyse, and manage any type of geographical data, has become the cornerstone of building master plans for cities of the future

Lack of definition of a 'smart city', inadequate initial outlay and funding issues were some of the biggest roadblocks to its success

The ministry had kept the slot for the 100th city, Shillong, vacant as it could not submit its proposal on time.

Under the smart city mission, the government has so far identified 99 cities for upgradation which would require a total investment of about Rs 2.03 trillion