Exploring the role of smart cities in shaping sustainable urban development in India
- Vol.19(2), Apr-June
- New Delhi Institute of Town Planners 2022
- 47-53p.
In response to massive urbanization challenge, a mission to build 100 smart cities was launched in 2014, covering 100 smart cities. However, after seven years since its inception, Indian smart cities are struggling to show any meaningful impacts on the ground. The mission has come under severe criticism due to its lack of core focus, for harbouring superfluous ideas without much back-end research and innovation and for its mission condition to create a special purpose vehicle (SPV) for project implementation. As a result, at the end of its mission period, it is unclear whether the mission would be continued in near future. This paper argues that, considering this massive gap in demand and supply of basic services, human and financial resources, Indian cities are left with very little choices, but to pro-actively explore the opportunities of applying digital technologies for optimization of urban systems and processes. Instead of focussing on several areas, the future version of this mission should entirely focus on the core urban challenges such as urban planning and land management, resilient service delivery and minimizing the externalities.