Comments
The Centre is gearing up to launch the Smart Cities project on September 1. It has asked the States and urban bodies to set up Special Purpose Vehicles (SPV) to develop the respective cities as smart cities.
"In the first phase we will take up 20 cities. The 100 cities that have been enlisted would have to compete to get a slot in the first list," Minister for Urban Development M Venkaiah Naidu has said.
Addressing a press conference here on Saturday on the sidelines of a national conference on smart technologies, he said the Government would give Rs 100 crore each to the cities.
"The States will have to match this amount. They must develop public-private partnerships to make the smart cities a success. They must be able to raise user charges for the services," he said.
Earlier, addressing the conference, he said the Government intended to extend the programme further and make all the cities in the country 'smart'. "What we are doing in the 100 cities is just a beginning," he said.
Bills
He said the Government would talk to the Opposition to resolve the deadlock over the GST and land bills.
The bills, which were expected to be passed in the last session, could not be taken up following unabated protests by the Opposition.
Naidu said the Bills were of national importance and the "need of the hour is for us to pass them".
He said the Government would talk to the Opposition to iron out differences. "We need to take it up cutting across party lines," he said.
Comments
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.