Though crores of rupees have been spent on Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM), but issues pertaining to solid-waste management and waste water treatment were not addressed properly, said BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi on Thursday.
Speaking at the inaugural address of the National Summit on Inclusive Urban Development in the State Capital, Gujarat Chief Minister criticised the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for not taking the issues seriously. Recalling his meeting with Singh, Modi said that he insisted the Prime Minister to take up projects related to solid-waste management and waste-water treatment in 500 Indian cities in order to make them dirt free.
“I explained the revenue model of the projects how organic fertiliser and recycled water can be provided to villages for farming and irrigation. It would also help us to minimise conflict between rural and urban areas,” said Modi adding that however, the Prime Minister only praised the scheme but didn’t execute it.
Finally, the Gujarat Government has decided to implement both the projects in 50 cities through Public Private Partnership (PPP) model and within a short period, the State would reap the benefit out of it, he added.
“Instead of treating urbanisation as a burden, it should be treated as an opportunity and a matter of strength. We kept expressing concerns about villages reducing and the number of people in cities increasing. But what if we had accepted the truth, we would have addressed the issue more efficiently,” he said adding that with urbanisation happening at a great pace, we need to change old mindset and adopt latest technology and modern initiative to convert challenge into opportunity.
The glory of a city does not merely come by installing big gates or infrastructure only but it comes when each and every person of the city is integrated into the development journey, he added. Citing the inspiring example of Japan, which is hosting Olympic Games in 2020, Modi said that people should be motivated with occasion.
“We have two occasions coming up to make our urbanisation process fruitful with people’s participation. In 2022 India will celebrate 75th year of Independence. We can envisage and work on how our dream city would be in 2022. The other is to work towards clean cities keeping in mind the 150th birth anniversary celebrations of Mahatma Gandhi, who tried his best to spread the message of cleanliness,” said Modi.
The summit had participation from 26 States of India, over 400 districts and 134 Mayors, Deputy Mayors and other officials from various Indian cities. Besides Takeshi Yagi, the Ambassador of Japan remained present in the inaugural function.