Separate portal set up for smart city challenge

Tiruchi and Chennai will soon get a link in the web portal

The Ministry of Urban Development, which has embarked upon next stage of selecting 20 smart cities, for implementing the plan this year, has created a web portal for receiving suggestions from the stakeholders residing in respective cities.

The portal athttps://mygov.in/ group-issue/smart-city/will feature all 100 smart cities shortlisted by the Centre. It has so far created links for Bhopal, Gwalior, and Chandigarh. The residents have started posting suggestions for these three cities. Chennai and Tiruchi, which are among 12 smart cities selected in Tamil Nadu, is set to get a link at the portal. The consultants, who have been appointed by the State government for Chennai and Tiruchirapalli City Corporation for preparing Smart City Challenge Proposal, are working with the officials concerned of Ministry of Urban Development to create the link. Once it is created, the stakeholders, including citizens, non-profit organisation, civil activists, educational institutions, officials, students, officials, residents’ welfare associations, and others can post their comments and suggestions on smart city proposals.

Besides highlighting the problems, they can provide valuable solutions to the issues so as to include in the Smart City Challenge Proposal, said Simon Selvaraj, Associate Director, Strategic Consulting, JLL, representative of one of the consultants for Tiruchi and Chennai City Corporations.

The meaningful and constructive solutions and suggestions will be incorporated in the India Smart Cities Challenge, which is a competition to inspire and support municipal officials to get Rs. 500 crore fund, besides Rs. 500 crore from the State government, from the Ministry of Urban Development for the current year itself.

Meanwhile, the official website of Tiruchirappalli City Corporation has been linked with the website of India Smart City Challenge administered by the Bloomberg Philanthropies, a U.S.-based foundation partnering with the Centre on smart city challenge mission. A separate Facebook and Twitter accounts had been created for receiving suggestions for Tiruchirapalli Smart City proposal. The posts and discussions would be closely monitored so as to get valuable inputs, he added.