The government, on Friday, announced another list of 30 cities for development as smart cities, from altogether 90 cities picked up so far under the Smart City Mission. While Kerala's capital Thiruvananthapuram topped the list, Chhattisgarh's new capital Naya Raipur and Gujarat's Rajkot secured the second and third position respectively.
Interestingly, both the capitals of Jammu & Kashmir --- Jammu and Srinagar --- made it to the list, Congress chief Sonia Gandhi's constituency Raebareli failed to make a berth in the tally. Two cities of NCR – Meerut and Ghaziabad --- also failed to find its place in the final list of 30 Smart Cities and they would have to contest in the fourth round for their inclusion.
Announcing the list, Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu asserted that smart city development had been based on the shared vision of citizens and respective city governments and the central government had no interference in the selection. Rebutting the criticism in certain quarters that Smart City Mission is elitist, he said as the city governments and citizens had to make the advocacy of their respective cities, the mission guideline did not impose any restrictions to select any specific city for its area-based development.
The capital city of Uttarakhand Dehradun, however, made it this time to get its name in the list. Though Centre was expected to announce the names of 40 cities, non-participation of West Bengal and Mumbai brought the numbers down.
Naidu said that altogether 45 cities contested for 40 available smart city slots, but only 30 could ensure feasible and workable plans that match the aspirations of the citizens. "These cities have proposed to invest Rs 57,393 crore under respective smart city plans. With this, the total number of such cities have gone up to 90, with a total investment of Rs 1,91,155 crore," he said.
In what comes as another major initiative, the ministry of Urban Development had also launched the 'City Liveability Index', for measuring the quality of life in 116 major cities including smart cities, capital cities and cities with one million-plus.