Urban Development Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Friday made new additions to the smart cities mission. The fresh list includes the names of nine cities with Silvassa of Dadra and Nagar Haveli topping the list and three others from Uttar Pradesh making it.
Erode in Tamil Nadu, Diu in Union Territory of Daman and Diu, Biharsharif in Bihar, Bareilly, Saharanpur and Moradabad in Uttar Pradesh, Itanagar in Arunachal Pradesh and Kavaratti in Lakshadweep are the cities that are part of the new list.
With this the cumulative number of cities selected under the smart city programme has gone up to 99 which is close to the mission of hundred smart cities that was announced by PM Narendra Modi in June 2015.
"It is heartening to note that the winning cities have improved the quality of their Smart City Proposals by 19 per cent (average) to become eligible for selection," Puri told the media at the event, according to a government statement.
"Nine cities selected have proposed an investment of Rs 12,824 crore, of which Rs 10,639 crore would be in Area Based Development (ABD) and Rs 2,185 crores in 'pan city' initiatives which would be impacting 35.3 lakh persons living in these areas," he added.
As per the statement, the total estimated investment in the 99 proposed smart cities will be Rs 2,03,979 crore.
Earlier, 20 cities were selected in January 2016, 13 cities in May 2016, 27 cities in September 2016 and 30 cities in June 2017.
