Rourkela is now on the runway for inclusion in the Smart City projects. The Sundargarh district administration along with the Rourkela Municipal Corporation (RMC) are making efforts to upgrade the steel city’s physical and social infrastructures along with waste management and city development plans to come out successful at a national level competition to be held shortly.
Chief Secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi took a review of the progress done in this matter at a high-level meeting at the State Secretariat here on Thursday. He directed the RMC to finalise the upgradation proposal by June 25 reflecting the people’s aspiration and community needs.
Replying to a media query, Padhi said. “We discussed about the vision statement of Rorkela Smart City, the project components implementation mechanism, convergence with other ongoing programmes, etc. Around 24 aspirational points have been identified. The Rourkela Municipality would finalise the draft including all these inputs. The project would be sent to the Government of India by June 30.
The important components of the Smart City project included riverfront development at Panposh, connected neighbourhood, complete streets, 24x7 water supply, multi-utility citizen service, entrepreneurship development, children and senior citizen-friendly civic life, transport complex, development of smart corridor, development of core business and core institutional area, development of tribal art and culture, housing and social infrastructure, etc.
Housing & Urban Development Special Secretary Shishir Kumar Ratho, BMC Municipal Commissioner Kishan Kumar, Sundargarh Collector Bhupindra Singh Poonia, Rourkela ADM Monisha Banarjee and RMC Commissioner Akshya Kumar Mallck along with project consultants from the DFID participated in the deliberations.