The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pet project Smart Cities Mission for upgradation of 100 cities and Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) of 500 cities. The Smart Cities Mission has received an outlay of Rs48,000 crore, and AMRUT has got Rs50,000 crore. AMRUT will replace UPA’s flagship scheme, JNNURM. Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired the Cabinet meet. A senior official said that the AMRUT will be implemented in 500 cities and towns with population of one lakh and above.
Under AMRUT, named after former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, States will be given the freedom of designing their own schemes. They will only need to submit an annual action plan to the Centre for broad concurrence, based on which funds will be released. The Central Government will not appraise individual projects.
“Central assistance will be to the extent of 50 per cent of project cost for cities and towns with a population up to ten lakh and one-third of the project cost for those with a population of above ten lakh.
“Central assistance will be released in three installments of 20 per cent, 40 per cent and the remaining 40 based on achievement of milestones indicated in State Annual Action Plans. AMRUT seeks to lay foundation to enable cities and towns to eventually grow into smart cities,” said a Government official from the Urban Development Ministry.
Under the Smart Cities Mission, each of 100 cities will get Central assistance of Rs100 crore per year for five years. The cities will be selected through a “city challenge competition”.
“Each State will shortlist a certain number of smart city aspirants as per the norms to be indicated and they will prepare smart city proposals for further evaluation for extending Central support,” the official said.
Key focus areas of the mission include clean water supply, sanitation and solid waste management, efficient mobility and public transport, affordable housing and governance.
The Cabinet also gave its nod for two-year extension to the housing projects under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM), which would benefit more than 3 lakh urban poor in getting pucca houses.
Initially, the duration of JNNURM was seven years till 2011-12 and the housing sub-missions — Basic Services to the Urban Poor (BSUP) and Integrated Housing and Slum Development Programme (IHSDP) — under it were extended till March 2015. Two-year extension aims to help the States complete their housing projects with the help of central fund.