No compromise in quality of smart city plans, says Naidu.

Central government has announced another list of 30 cities for development as smart cities taking the total cities picked up so far to 90 under Smart City Mission launched on June 25, 2015.

Announcing the new names of latest to be developed into smart cities at a National Workshop on Urban Transformation, the Minister of Urban Development and Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation M. Venkaiah Naidu said that 45 cities contested for 40 available smart city slots but only 30 were selected to ensure feasible and workable plans that match the aspirations of the citizens as directed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi while launching the mission.

The 30 cities announced on 23 June 2017 are:

Trivendrum, Kerala. Naya Raipur, Chattisgarh. Rajkit, Gujarat. Amaravati, Andhra Pradesh. Patna, Bihar. Karimnagar, Telangana. Muzaffarpur, Bihar. Puducherry, Puducherry. Gandhinagar, Gujarat. Srinagar, Jammu & Kashmir. Sagar, Madhya Pradesh. Karnal, Haryana. Satna, MP. Bengaluru, Karnataka. Shimla, Himachal Pradesh. Dehradun, Uttarakhand. Tiruppur, Tamil Nadu. Pimpri chinchwad, Maharashtra. Bilaspur, Chattisgarh. Pasighat, Arunachal Pradesh. Jammu, Jammu & Kashmir. Dahod, Gujarat. Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu. Thootukkudi, Tamil Nadu. Tiruchirapalli, Tamil Nadu. Jhansi, UP. Aizawl, Mizoram. Allahabad, UP. Aligarh, UP. Gangtok, Sikkim.

Naidu said the 30 cities would require proposed investment of Rs.57,393 crore under respective smart city plans.

This includes Rs.46,879 crore for ensuring core infrastructure in the areas identified by citizens for area based development and Rs.10,514 crore for technology based solutions for improving governance, service delivery and utilization of infrastructure.

With this the total investment approved under the smart city plans of 90 cities has gone up to Rs.1,91,155 crore.

The Minister said that 20 cities will be contesting for the remaining 10 slots under smart city mission. These are; Itanagar (Arunachal Pradesh), Biharsharif (Bihar), Diu (Daman & Diu), Silvassa (Dadra and Nager Haveli), Kavaratti (Lakshadweep), Navimumbai, Greater Mumbai and Amaravati (Maharashtra), Imphal (Manipur), Shillong (Meghalaya), Dindigul and Erode(Tamil Nadu), Bidhannagar, Durgapur and Haldia (West Bengal), Meerut,Rai Bareilly, Ghaziabad, Sharanpur and Rampur (UP).

Selection of cities for smart city development is running ahead of schedule and the remaining cities would submit revised smart city plans for filling up the vacant slots, he said. fii-news.com