Union Urban Ministry and USTDA together to pursue smart cities

City-wise Task Forces were set up by the Union Urban Ministry in line with the MoU signed between the three Indian State governments and the United States Trade Development Agency (USTDA) towards the Smart City initiative

The Dollar Business Bureau Smart Cities The Union Minister of Urban Development, M Venkaiah Naidu on Wednesday has set up city-wise Task Forces for drawing action plans, as a part of the Government of India’s (GoI) Smart City initiative, towards the development of three Indian cities- Ajmer, Allahabad and Visakhapatnam. Setting up of these task forces by the government comes as a follow up to the meeting that was held between the Union Urban Minister and the US Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker in New Delhi recently. This move by the Union Urban Ministry gains importance in view of the agreement that was made between the respective state governments and the United States Trade Development Agency (USTDA) towards development of Ajmer, Allahabad and Visakhapatnam as smart cities. All the committees that were set up will have in common, the representatives from the Urban Ministry, Ministry of External Affairs, respective State governments and the concerned officials of the USTDA. As a special case, the Visakhapatnam Committee will have the Indian Navy also along with other representatives. On January 25, 2015, the USTDA and the respective state governments signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) towards the development of the above three states as smart cities under GoI’s Smart City initiative. The implementation of above plan was also one of the key strategic initiatives discussed by Narendra Modi and Obama during the former’s United States (US) trip, in which the US expressed its willingness and agreed to provide assistance to the project. In its latest official release, the Urban Development Ministry also informed that a total of 46 Pubic-Private-Partnership (PPP) projects are at various stages of implementation in 33 cities across the country, which includes Mass Rapid Transport Systems (19), Solid Waste Management, Water supplies, among others. All the current projects under implementation are running at a total approved cost of Rs 25,902.84 crore for infrastructure development in urban areas, the Ministry informed. The Ministry also informed about the 24 PPP projects that have so far been completed at an investment of Rs 1,659.32 crore. Since 2012, a total Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) of $6,405 million (Rs 34,255 crore) has been enabled in 16 urban projects pertained to Townships, Housing, Built-up infrastructure and Construction, the Minister added.