About the schemes 

To recast the urban landscape of the country, to make urban areas more livable and inclusive besides driving the economic growth, the Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs has launched two centrally sponsored schemes namely the Smart Cities Mission and the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT).

About Smart cities mission  

• Under the Smart Cities Mission, each selected city would get central assistance of Rs.100 crore per year for five years.  
• This Mission of building 100 smart cities intends to promote adoption of smart solutions for efficient use of available assets, resources and infrastructure with the objective of enhancing the quality of urban life and providing a clean and sustainable environment.  
• Special emphasis will be given to participation of citizens in prioritizing and planning urban interventions. 

Approach  

• It will be implemented through an ‘area based’ approach consisting of retrofitting, redevelopment, pan-city initiatives and development of new cities.  
• Under retrofitting, deficiencies in an identified area will be addressed through necessary interventions  .
• Redevelopment enables reconstruction of an already built-up area that is not amenable for any interventions, to make it smart  
• Pan-city components could be interventions like Intelligent Transport Solutions that benefits all residents by reducing commuting time.

Focus  

Smart cities initiative, focus will be on core infrastructure services like: 

• Adequate and clean Water supply, 
• Sanitation and Solid Waste Management, 
• Efficient Urban Mobility and Public Transportation, 
• Affordable housing for the poor, power supply, 
• robust IT connectivity, 
• Governance, especially e-governance and citizen participation, 
• safety and security of citizens, 
• health and education and 
• sustainable urban environment. 

Implementation  

Smart City Action Plans will be implemented by Special Purpose Vehicles (SPV) to be created for each city and state governments will ensure a steady stream of resources for SPVs. 

About AMRUT  

• AMRUT seeks to lay a foundation to enable cities and towns to eventually grow into smart cities.  
• AMRUT adopts a project approach to ensure basic infrastructure services relating to water supply, sewerage, septage management, storm water drains, transport and development of green spaces and parks with special provision for meeting the needs of children.

Coverage  

This Mission will be implemented in 500 cities and towns each with a population of one lakh and above, some cities situated on stems of main rivers, a few capital cities and important cities located in hilly areas, islands and tourist areas. 

Approach  

Implementation of this Mission will be linked to promotion of urban reforms such as 

• e-governance, 
• constitution of professional municipal cadre, 
• devolving funds and functions to urban local bodies, 
• review of Building bye-laws, 
• improvement in assessment and collection of municipal taxes,
• credit rating of urban local bodies, 
• energy and water audit and 
• Citizen-centric urban planning. 

Funding  

• Central assistance will be to the extent of 50 percent of project cost for cities and towns with a population of up to 10 lakh and one-third of the project cost for those with a population of above 10 lakh.  
• Central assistance will be released in three instalments in the ratio of 20:40:40 based on achievement of milestones indicated in State Annual Action Plans.

Why in News?

The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs recently provided details about the on-going projects under AMRUT and Smart Cities Mission.