Centre insisting on 50:50 funding pattern for project
SHILLONG: Fund crunch may prove to be a big obstacle for the State government in its bid to upgrade its proposal to bid for the ambitious ‘smart city’ project, with the Union government harping on a 50:50 funding pattern for the project.
Earlier, the Union government had announced the first list of 20 urban areas that would be developed as ‘smart cities’ with only Guwahati qualifying from among the Northeastern cities and Shillong finding itself on the 70th rank in the list.
Government sources on Monday informed that despite the fund concerns the State government is preparing an upgraded plan to be submitted to the Union government for evaluation and consideration.
According to the sources, the Centre had objected to several critical points in the first plan submitted by the State government.
Shillong, it may be reminded, is among the 98 cities selected by the Central government for the ‘smart city’ project which is an area based approach to re-develop an area with modern amenities. The proposed ‘smart cities’, to be developed in a phased manner, will have smart public transport system and IT enabled solutions, besides other features.
With an aim to achieve ‘inclusive growth’, the Smart City Mission promotes integrated city planning, where the government’s policies such as Swachh Bharat Mission and Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation complement each other.
