A year on, PM Modi gives fresh impetus to Smart Cities Mission

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The Prime Minister announces several projects for Pune, various other cities

The Smart Cities Mission announced a year ago got a fresh impetus on June 25, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi officially unveiling several projects for Pune as well some other cities.

His announcements made in Pune covered several projects to be implemented in the 20 cities featuring in the first list of smart cities. These projects include slum rehabilitation, street and pedestrian walkway, modern buses with alternative fuels, traffic demand modelling project and city common mobility card.

The Prime Minister’s announcements also included projects with a total investment of Rs 2,900 crore in states including Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand and Odisha under the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT). These include sewerage projects with an investment of Rs 1,275 crore and water supply projects at a cost of Rs 817 crore.

He underlied that urbanisation should be looked upon as an opportunity and not a problem. Modi also stressed on the spirit of “participative governance” and that people living in cities have to decide about the development of their urban spaces as these decisions cannot be taken by people sitting in Delhi.

Modi said that an era of competition has been ushered in for improving conditions in urban areas and urged the citizens to rise to the challenge for bettering the conditions in respective cities and towns.