Union Territory Puducherry has earned the distinction to be the first city to send its nomination to the Centre for inclusion in the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious programme ‘100 Smart City Mission’ which was launched just a month ago.
Chief Secretary of Puducherry has forwarded the nomination along with all the forms and documents including the details of evaluation of all the five urban local bodies (UlBs) in the Union Territory as required in the Stage-1 of ‘City Challenge’ competition, said an official from the Urban Development Ministry which is overseeing the flagship scheme.
These UlBs include Puducherry, Oulgaret, Kariakal, Mahe and Yanam. The official said that Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu has complimented the Puducherry Government for being the first to send Smart City nomination and urged the Chief Minister N Rangaswamy to keep up the momentum.
Puducherry which has a population of 6,57,209 has done well in respect of several Stage-1 evaluation criteria and scored 75 of the possible 100 marks. “The Puducherry Municipal Corporation has achieved 18 per cent improvement in provision of household sanitary latrines since 2011 while increased internal revenue generation continuously over the three year period 2012-13 to 2014-15 marking an improvement of 14 per cent, as per the UT’report to the Ministry,” the official added.