The Union Urban Development Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu announced 30 more cities to be added under the Centre’s Smart cities Mission on Friday with an investment of 57,393 crores, reaching the total numbers of smart cities to 90.
Last year in January list of twenty shortlisted smart cities was released which marked the beginning of the launch of smart cities mission drive in India.
Mr Naidu earlier made it clear that Ministry is not involved in the selection of the cities shortlisted to be developed into smart city but an expert committee is constituted for the drive.
He also said the a total of 98 cities have been shortlisted by the committee, out of which 24 cities will be graduated into capital cities, 24 into business and industrial centres, 18 into culture and tourism areas, five into port cities and three into education and health care hubs down the line in the next five years.
This year Mr. Naidu added another 20 cities under the smart cities mission initiated last year.
Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala topped this year’s smart city mission along with other selected cities Naya Raipur in Chhattisgarh, Rajkot in Gujarat, Amravati in Andhra Pradesh, Patna in Bihar, Karimnagar in Telangana, Muzaffarpur in Bihar, Puducherry, Gandhinagar in Gujarat, Srinagar in Jammu and Kashmir, Sagar in Madhya Pradesh, Karnal in Haryana, Satna in Madhya Pradesh, Bengaluru in Karnataka, Shimla in Himachal Pradesh, Dehradun in Uttarakhand, Tirupur in Tamil Nadu, Pimpri Chinchwad in Maharashtra, Bilaspur in Chhattisgarh, Pasighat in Arunachal Pradesh, Jammu in J&K, Dahod in Gujarat, Tirunelveli, Thootukkudi and Tiruchirapalli in Tamil Nadu, Jhansi in Uttar Pradesh, Aizawl in Mizoram, Allahabad and Aligarh in U.P. and Gangtok in Sikkim.
Another 20 cities selected under the remaining ten spots under this mission are Itanagar in Arunachal Pradesh, Biharsharif in Bihar, Diu in Daman & Diu, Silvassa in Dadra and Nager Haveli, Kavaratti in Lakshadweep, Navi Mumbai, Greater Mumbai and Amaravati in Maharashtra, Imphal in Manipur, Shillong in Meghalaya, Dindigul and Erode in Tamil Nadu, Bidhannagar, Durgapur and Haldia in West Bengal, Meerut, Rai Bareilly, Ghaziabad, Sharanpur and Rampur in U.P.
A ‘smart city’ is basically an urban region or city where Information Technology is the principal infrastructure with other developments like overall infrastructure, sustainable real estate, communications and market viability, The Hindu reported