Volume V l Issue 5 Pages 24 www.urbannewsdigest.in `50 / us $5 july 2016

workingcities 04

healthycities 07

humanecities 09

greencities 10

integratedcities 20

digitalcities 16

smartcities 02

connectedcities 13

resilientcities 06

vibrantcities 18

happeningcities 23

capexcities 21

PM Modi launches Smart City Mission into implementation mode

Dholera smart city to be operational by 2019, says Gujarat govt

Elevated corridors announced for Mumbai local trains

Centre set to launch a portal for smart cities

Uttarakhand to promote eco-tourism through dak bungalow

Mahindra World City to build its future cities in smaller formats

Curve Appeal to become world’s first 3D-printed freeform house

Shimla plans to have an action plan to counter disaster risks

SWES to provide electricity to unelectrified areas

4800 villages in Gujarat declared Open Defecation Free (ODF)

India invites investment from German firms for infrastructure sector

Addition of 9 sq m carpet area required under urban housing mission

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi has launched the flagship Smart City Mission into implementation mode with the launch of 14 proj-ects of Pune’s Smart City Plan at the first-anniversary celebration of the Smart Cities Mission and AMRUT by releasing the Mis-sion Guidelines.

Speaking on the occasion in the Shiv Chhatrapati Sports Com-plex in Pune, Prime Minister said that Smart City Mission is now succeeding as a people’s movement as envisaged. He expressed satisfaction over citizen participation in the preparation of smart city plans of various cities with over 25 lakh people giving seri-ous suggestions on MyGov.in. Modi clarified that the central gov-ernment did not select the smart cities but it was the citizens who enabled their selection in the ‘City Challenge Competition.’ He asserted that if people were empowered and involved in partici-patory development, the country would progress fast.

Narendra Modi said that an era of competition has been ush-ered in for improving conditions in urban areas and urged the cit-izens to rise to the challenge for bettering the conditions in respec-tive cities and towns.

Stating that he has recently reviewed the progress of Smart City Mission over the last one year, Prime Minister expresses sat-isfaction over enthusiastic and large scale participation of people in the formulation of comprehensive smart city plans, the way the City Challenge Competition was held for selection of cities, formulation of projects thereunder and their launch. He compli-mented the team led by Minister of Urban Development M Ven-kaiah Naidu.

During his 35 minute address, Prime Minister elaborated on the concept of smart cities and the advantages that follow from it. Modi stressed that it should not be seen as a fancy concept since the mission is meant for ensuring availability of all basic services to the people though necessary infrastructure including houses for urban poor in a comprehensive manner. He referred to

the extensive use of digital technology in the smart city plans for improving the quality of governance and public services.

Asserting that urbanization mitigates poverty and empow-ers the poor, Modi said that it should be seen as an opportunity instead of a problem.

Prime Minister stressed that if people were empowered and involved in participatory development, the country would develop fast. Noting that an era of competition among cities and towns has come to prevail, he urged the citizens to rise to the challenge for improvement of respective urban areas.

Referring to the changing attitudes, Modi said that gone were the days when the central government was looked as a giver of funds, it was now being looked at as a source of ideas. Elaborating on this, Modi said that in all the recent surveys conducted, Swachh Bharat Mission was ranked the most popular of government’s ini-tiatives since the idea of sanitation appealed to the people.

Prime Minister also launched ‘Make Your City Smart’ contest inviting people to come out with designs for street, junctions and open spaces and a ‘Smart Net Portal’ which is a net based plat-form for sharing of ideas and sourcing of solutions for smart city development.

Speaking on the occasion, Minister of Urban Development M Venkaiah Naidu said that the smart city projects launched were the first shoots of the urban renaissance taking place in the coun-try as a result of a paradigm shift in the approaches to urban devel-opment ushered in by the government. He further said that the journey towards the much desired urban transformation has begun in a Team India spirit with the collective effort of people, urban local bodies and State Governments. This transformation is an integral part of ‘Making of Developed India’, he said.

Chief Ministers of Rajasthan, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh Vasundhara Raje Scindia, Naveen Patnaik and N Chandrababu Naidu outlined their smart city vision through video link.

Posted at NDPSO, New Delhi - 110 002 on 16th and 17th of every month | Date of Publication 10/11 of every month | Postal Registration No. DL(S)-01/3406/2012-14 | RNI No. DELENG/2012/41753

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urban news digest | July 2016 • 2SMart CitieS

Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi has expressed confidence that Puducherry would be included in the smart city proj-ect of the Union government in the next round.

Bedi said Puducherry deserved the smart city sta-tus and would earn its place in the list of smart cities. Empha-sising on the importance of connectivity she assured she would initiate efforts to improve air and rail connec-tivity in addition to working on waterways’ connectivity to Puducherry. She said the administration would set up a single window clearance sys-tem under the chairmanship of secretary to guide entre-preneurs and industrialists in establishing their units.

The industrialists and

entrepreneurs would be able to apply to the secretary directly and digitally. Their appli-cations would be processed and cleared in a specific time frame. Puducherry govern-ment would soon introduce an attractive industrial policy. The administration would encour-age non-polluting industries in the territory, stated Bedi.

The state government would soon organise business summit to invite NRIs, leading industrialists and corporate houses to invest in Puduch-erry. She said she would initiate efforts to revive all sick indus-tries including the government-owned Anglo-French Textiles. Bedi added that Puducherry would compete with Goa to emerge as the top tourism des-tination in the country.

British High Commissioner to India, Dominic Anthony Gerard Asquith informed that Britain would be collab-orating with the state gov-ernments and the municipal authorities to develop Pune (Maharashtra), Indore (MP) and Amravati (Andhra Pradesh) into smart cities.

The High Commissioner, who met Maharashtra Gov-ernor C Vidyasagar Rao at Raj Bhavan, said a centre of excellence in automo-bile skills would be set up in Pune.

Maharashtra would wel-come cooperation from Brit-ain in areas such as cleaning of rivers and water bodies,

sewage treatment and man-agement of solid waste, a Raj Bhavan spokesper-son said quoting Rao. Dep-uty High Commissioner of Britain in Mumbai Kumar Iyer was also present at the meeting.

13 new smart cities to create new centres of economic activity: JLL India

Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) India, giving thumbs up to the union government for the Smart City and AMRUT missions, said that the two flagship pro-grammes would help stimu-late the economy and create new economic centres in the country.

“It is exciting to see that these qualifying cities now have long-term five-year action plans

based on a comprehensive analysis of gaps in their pub-lic amenities and utilities and this is a step in the right direc-tion if we want to see more cit-ies emerging as economic cen-tres to reduce the pressure on select big cities,” said Anuj Puri, Chairman and Country Head, JLL India.

JLL also stated that with the latest addition of 13 more

cities, the smart cities mis-sion had made inroads into 25 states and union in India. “If we were to look at the Smart city and AMRUT qualifying cities together, they account for close to 70% of the total urban popu-lation of India. The latest list is a good mix of prominent indus-trial and cosmopolitan cities along with state capitals as well as Tier 3 and 4 cities and bodes well for a holistic approach to developing existing cities as Smart Cities,” Puri added.

Additionally, JLL also appre-ciated that the geographic spread of the new list of smart cities showed signs of develop-ment being focused towards the eastern and north-eastern part of the country, where infra-structure development is vital and in line with the Prime Min-ister’s vision to develop the east.

Puducherry to be included in smart city project, assures Kiran Bedi

Britain offers to develop Pune, Indore, and Amravati as smart cities

Dholera smart city to be operational by 2019, says Gujarat governmentThe Gujarat state government said that the upcoming smart city at Dholera Special Investment Region (SIR) would become oper-ational by 2019 with several indus-trial units and a population of around one lakh people living in it.

MD and CEO of Dholera SIR Ajay Bhadoo said Wipro Ltd has been selected to provide consul-tancy for setting up Information

and Communication Technol-ogy (ICT) infrastructure in the region, situated around 30 km from Ahmedabad.

“Wipro has been selected for providing ICT consultancy at Dholera SIR. This is the advent of smart component at the SIR. With such ICT infrastructure, Dhol-era would become country’s first and only Smart Component City,

which would be operational by 2019 having industrial units and a population of 1 lakh,” said Bha-doo, who is also the secretary in the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO).

Wipro would look after var-ious ICT facilities coming up at the Dholera SIR, such as inte-grated operation centre, e-gover-nance, data centre, city-wide net-work and city dashboards.

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3 URBAN NEWS DIGEST | JUly 2016 SMArt CItIES

Chief Secretary Sarvesh Kau-sha stated that it would take about five more months for the works to start under the Smart City project in Ludhiana. Kau-sha, who was in the city to par-ticipate in the first meeting of directors of SPV formed under the project, said removing traf-fic problems and dealing with increasing pollution would be their main concerns while working under the Smart City project. The authorities, for the next five months, would work to come up with a design for the project.

Kaushal was accompa-nied by local bodies’ secretary Vikas Pratap, JM Balamuru-gan from PMIDC and various

other officials from the district, which included mayor Har-charan Singh Gohalwaria, DC Ravi Bhagat, Police Commis-sioner Jatinder Singh Auakh and MC Chief Ghanshyam Thori.

The officials also gave a pre-sentation on the Smart City project where they explained the components of the project and how they were planning to move towards the urban trans-formation of the city. Kaushal stated that during the meeting members of the SPV talked about various points and dis-cussed various components on how the project would be taken up. He also congratu-lated the residents of the city

with whose support the city had been selected in the list of top 20 cities to be developed as smart cities.

Previously in the proposal for the smart city project, the authorities had proposed a

GIS-based property survey system and replacement of auto rickshaws with e-rick-shaws under pan-city proj-ect. In the area-based devel-opment, the authorities have selected the area alongside

Ferozepur Road, Ghumar Mandi Market and Sarabha Nagar market. Also, the MC would be working to pro-mote cycling in the areas coming under area-based development.

Smart city project of Ludhiana to begin after five months

On the first anniversary of the Smart City Mission, Rajasthan Chief Minister, Vasundhara Raje has ded-icated a number of projects for Jaipur smart city. The projects, unveiled at the Birla Auditorium, were a rooftop solar power plant, 14 traditional step wells, park and real-time Pub-lic Information System in Bus-Q-Shelter.

“The day is not far when with the vision and the inspiration of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the city of Jaipur would rank number one in the Smart City Mission,” Raje said. “Under the

Swachh Bharat Mission too, Rajasthan is ahead of other states. Bikaner has already become open defecation-free district in the state and seven other districts would also become open defecation-free,” she said.

Odisha CM requests PM Modi to include more cities in smart city list Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has urged Prime Min-ister Narendra Modi to consider including Cuttack, Sambalpur and Berhampur in the Smart City list. Speaking through video conferencing during the launch of the flagship Smart City Mis-sion into implementation mode by PM Modi, Patnaik said, “I am sure Hon’ble Prime Minister will kindly consider including the historic cities of Cuttack, Sam-balpur and Berhampur.”

“… with Bhubaneswar hav-ing topped the Smart City chal-lenge, the people of other cities also aspire to be included in this initiative,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Odisha gov-ernment said that it would

submit the final project plan for Rourkela Smart City soon. The project proposal envisaged an investment of around `2,500 crore out of which `500 crore is expected from the Union Gov-ernment and rest `2,000 crore would be arranged from state government and other sources by way of convergence.

The state level high-pow-ered committee meeting held under the chairmanship of Chief

Secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi gave green signal to the project for onward transmission to the central government.

“We discussed about the smart city proposal of Rourkela city. The project would be sub-mitted to government for onward transmission to Govt of India. Rourkela, this time, would compete with 66 other cities of the country in smart city com-petition,” said the chief secretary.

Rajasthan CM dedicates projects for Jaipur smart city

Development of smart cities has to be done smartly: Piyush Goyal Power and Coal Minister Piyush Goyal said development of smart cities in the country would have to be customised to the Indian con-text while leveraging on econo-mies of scale to make the requisite technology affordable. He stated that the development of smart cit-ies or towns would have to be done ‘smartly.’

“We got to think smart when we think of smart cities or smart technologies playing a role in India. How can we do it custom-ised to the Indian context. How

can we do it with the bare bone essentials, which would help have an impact. How can we do it to scale so that we can lever-age the large economies of scale,” Goyal said.

The minister stated the power of economies of scale, the power of leveraging billion plus aspiring individuals, ensuring affordabil-ity to make a programme self-sus-tainable, practical application in the Indian context are the keys to the implementation of smart cities. He talked about the importance of

disposal of wastage for the smart city movement and stressed on the need for adequate dustbins at an affordable cost.

On energy efficiencies, Goyal mentioned that the centre is run-ning a 770-million LED bulb pro-gramme, which would cost less than $1 billion with no government investment. The cost of the LED bulb has come down by 83% from `310 to ̀ 54.90 per piece, Goyal said adding people could save `6.5 bil-lion every year in their electricity bills by switching to LED bulbs.

According to officials, Vado-dara Municipal Corporation (VMC) has sent its proposal for inclusion in the list of cities identified for the third phase of Centre’s Smart City project. Vadodara Municipal Commissioner Vinod Rao informed that the revised proposal has been submitted to the central government.

“If chosen, the city would be granted `500 crore in the next five years. The project guidelines include city retro-fitting, pan-city initiative for smart solutions and some of

these features have already been initiated in the city, so we are better positioned in many aspects,” Rao said.

The revised proposal has been prepared through PwC India, upon data col-lection on various aspects such as water supply, power supply, sanitation including solid waste management, mobility and public trans-port, affordable housing, IT connectivity and digitisa-tion, safety and security of citizens, health and education.

vadodara sends revised proposal for smart city project

urban news digest | July 2016 • 4SpecialFeatures working CitieS

Urban Development Minis-ter M Venkaiah Naidu, seeking German investment in India’s infrastructure sector, said that the partnership between the two countries “should and will flourish” as he invited participa-tion of its business community in India’s “urban renaissance.”

“Indo-German partnership should and will flourish. You will be able to see for yourself the winds of change in India. We are very keen to develop the sectors where you are strong,” said Naidu while addressing a conference.

He stated that India is at the “threshold of rapid urbanisa-tion” and is among the “fast-est urbanising societies” of the world and is projected to become more urban by 2050.

“With 17% of people liv-ing in urban areas at the time of independence, urbanisation increased to over 31% in 2011 and set to reach 40% by 2030,” Naidu said, adding that this demo-graphic transition brings along with it “serious challenges and

opportunities too.”Naidu listed various initia-

tives including Smart City Mis-sion, Atal Mission for Rejuvena-tion and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) and Swachh Bharat Mission for addressing the “huge” gaps in urban infra-structure. Noting that Germany is already assisting in the devel-opment of Bhubaneswar, Kochi and Coimbatore as smart cities, he said, “My visit is to explore more investment assistance for remaining Smart Cities.”

Highlighting the potential of various schemes, he said the investment in the proposed 100 smart cities works out to $40 billion by 2020, while the total

outlay under AMRUT is $8 bil-lion over five years for 500 cities and estimated the cost of imple-mentation of Clean India Mis-sion in Urban areas is $10 billion.

He said the government would also introduce Pub-lic Utility (Resolution of Dis-putes) Bill for dispute resolu-tion in infrastructure related construction projects, public-private partnership (PPP) and public utility contracts. Empha-sising that an essential feature of “Urban Renaissance is green development”, the minister added, “This we will learn from Germany’s leadership in envi-ronmental-friendly and sustain-able urban development.”

India invites investment from German firms for infrastructure sector

indian railways signs pact with odisha government for rail infrastructureIndian Railways has signed a pact with the Odisha gov-ernment for setting up a joint venture company for develop-ment of rail infrastructure in the eastern state.

As per the agreement, Railways would have 49% stake while the state govern-ment would own 51% in the JV company which would iden-tify projects for development and mobilisation of financial resources for their execution, said an official statement.

As part of it, the two part-ners would fund part of such identified projects. Project-specific special purpose vehi-cles (SPVs) would also be

formed after the financial clo-sure of the project.

In view of growing demands for railway lines in various states and huge requirement of funds to exe-cute them, Railway Minis-ter Suresh Prabhu in his bud-get speech had announced the setting up of joint ventures with states for focused project development, resource mobil-isation, land acquisition, proj-ect implementation and mon-itoring of critical rail projects.

As many as 17 state govern-ments have consented to the formation of JV companies for development of rail infrastruc-ture in their respective state.

greater mumbai mulls setting up parking spaces for bicyclesMunicipal Commissioner of Greater Mumbai, Ajoy Mehta said that a parking authority is being planned which would focus on creating spaces to park bicycles.

“We’re working on a park-ing authority for Mumbai which looks at parking not just for cars, but for cycles also. It will create an environment for people to cycle to work,” Mehta said on the sidelines of the annual ‘cycle to work’ event in Mumbai.

He stated that the Munic-ipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) is looking at places where people can safely park their bicycles so that the usage of bicycle in the city can increase.

Stressing that cycling is not a sport; Mehta said that it is the

only activity, which benefits both the environment and the person indulging in it, through better health.

He also called on public par-ticipation to boost cycling, say-ing “we need a people’s move-ment for cycling in the city.”

Smar Commute Founda-tion’s Feroza Suresh said the city would soon begin the

monthly ‘critical mass’ event on the last Friday of every month starting in June.

“To start with, we’ve iden-tified 17 business hubs where people will be assembling and riding together at a specified time to assert the need to be considerate towards them on the road and co-exist peace-fully,” she said.

Maharashtra government is set to announce a policy to regulate app-based cab services like Ola and Uber, and control their oper-ations in the Mumbai Metropoli-tan Region in addition to provid-ing them with fare meters.

“The new policy, that is awaiting final approval of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, entails regulating the fares of these online cab service provid-ers,” said state Minister for Pub-lic Transport Diwakar Raote.

Raote said app-based taxi operators like Ola and Uber would be allowed to operate only within the Mumbai Metro-politan Region (MMR).

In view of rising popular-ity of ride-sharing firms, Raote advised the regular yellow

and black taxis to improve the quality of their services and to launch their own mobile applications.

The state government also aims to bring a law to deal with traffic violations and it would cover provisions that have been left out of the purview of the central Act, he stated.

Henceforth, while approv-ing tenders for new state high-ways, the government would incorporate provisions for installation of integrated traf-fic management systems like CCTVs to detect rash driving, drunken driving, speeding, lane cutting and other traffic viola-tions, the minister said.

maharashtra to announce policy to regulate app-based cab services

Science of Cities tool measures the impact of cities on peopleUN-Habitat would release details of a new scientific tool which measures the rate of global urbanisation, its char-acteristics and the potential effect of urban sprawl on the quality of life for city inhabit-ants. The UN Sample of Cities

uses a representative sample of 200 cities worldwide, both in the developed and develop-ing world, to track and inter-pret trends relating to aspects of urban life as diverse as air and water quality, the time it takes to travel from home to work, physical proximity to employment, housing afford-ability, and access to enjoyable public space.

The UN Sample of Cities provides open-source data to researchers to draw scien-tifically valid comparisons between world cities.

This ‘science of cit-ies’ adopts cities as units of analysis and studies them together to discover patterns

of similarities and differences and the consequent impact of urbanisation on human qual-ity of life.

The UN Sample of Cit-ies was created, tested, and applied in a series of studies undertaken by a tri-partite col-

laboration between UN-Habi-tat, the NYU Urban Expansion Program at New York Univer-sity, and the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.

Three additional research programs in this tri-par-tite collaboration are already making use of the UN Sample of Cities. One program uses detailed satellite imagery anal-ysis to measure the proportion of public and private space and the quality of the urban fab-ric. A second uses a network of on-the-ground informants to gather information on the regulatory regimes govern-ing land and housing, while a third program measures hous-ing affordability.

5 URBAN NEWS DIGEST | JUly 2016 WOrkInG CItIES

Chief Minister of Maharashtra Devendra Fadnavis said 10 cities in the state would be developed on the lines of Centre’s Smart City programme.

“10 cities in the state would be developed on the lines of the Smart City programme (of the Union government),” said Fad-navis. “Credible, efficient, trans-parent, and inclusive planning was the base for (any) smart city. And these cities (to be devel-oped) would be provided with necessary funds,” he added.

The Chief Minister further stated the Smart City concept

initiated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi “was not meant only for handful of rich people but was meant for one and all from the cities.”

Meanwhile, the Chief Minis-ter said hereafter the civic bod-ies would not be given permis-sion for dumping grounds.

“Instead, they (the civic bod-ies) should find the ways and means to dispose of the waste scientifically,” he said.

“We (the state government) will think positively to imple-ment cluster development for Kalyan-Dombivili on the lines

of the one in Thane city,” Fad-navis said.

The Chief Minister also informed Oracle has selected twin cities of Kalyan-Dombivili for implementation of its e-gov-ernance pilot project.

“The technology being used in Los Angeles (in the United States) would be used in Kalyan-Dombivili. In this connection, a team of (state government) offi-cials would be visiting the firm’s headquarters in Bengaluru on June 22. A MoU will be inked with the company in July (in this regard),” he said.

10 cities in Maharashtra to be developed on lines of Smart Cities: Maharashtra CM

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the government would take steps to boost the talks for a proposed free trade agreement (FTA) and commence negotia-tions for a Comprehensive Eco-nomic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) with Thailand. He was speaking after his first bilateral meeting with Thailand’s Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha in New Delhi.

“We see a particular synergy between Thai strengths in infra-structure, particularly tourism infrastructure, and India’s pri-orities in this field. Informa-tion Technology, pharmaceu-ticals, auto components, and machinery are some other areas of promising collaboration. We also see early conclusion of a balanced Comprehensive Eco-nomic and Partnership Agree-ment as our shared priority,” said Modi.

PM Chan-o-chan also agreed that while India and Thailand had already been negotiating an FTA, the talks should be made all encompassing by taking the trading relations beyond just goods to include services and investments.

“Both countries recognised the importance of bilateral trade and noted that the bilateral eco-nomic relations are deep-rooted in the existing framework including bilateral Free Trade

Agreement, ASEAN India Trade in Goods Agreement and Early Harvest Scheme. Both countries agreed that the same may be enhanced further by striving to increase bilateral trade and engaging in bilateral and multilateral forums. Thai-land took note of Indian initia-tive in further deepening bilat-eral economic ties towards comprehensive economic cooperation,” stated a joint statement.

Implementation of new Urban Missions viz., Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT), Smart City Mission and Swachh Bharat Mission in the States of Punjab, Haryana and the Union Territory of Chandi-garh was reviewed in Chandi-garh recently.

Rajiv Gauba, Secretary (Urban Development), Gov-ernment of India along with concerned Mission Directors from the Ministry of Urban Development, Chief Secretar-ies of Punjab and Haryana, Advisor to the Administrator of Chandigarh and concerned officials besides some Munic-ipal Commissioners attended the day-long review meetings held separately state-wise

at the Secretariats of Pun-jab, Haryana, and UT Guest House. District Collectors and other field officials partici-pated in the review through video-conferencing.

These meetings are being held as a part of State-wise review meetings being held by the Ministry of Urban Development in respective capital cities. Such reviews have so far been held in Bengaluru, Mumbai, Jaipur and Visakhapatnam.

France keen on partnering with PuducherryChief Minister of Puducherry V Narayanasamy has informed that the French government is interested in collaborat-ing with the union territory’s administration for infrastruc-tural development and aca-demic programmes. Speaking to reporters after a meeting with the Ambassador desig-nate of France to India Alex-andre Ziegler, Narayanasamy said he had highlighted vari-ous sectors where collabora-tive initiatives between France and Puducherry could be taken up.

The French connection that Puducherry has helped in strengthening the bonds with France, he stated, adding France was keen on promot-ing developmental activities. A proposal to set up smart city in Puducherry has already dis-cussed with the Centre and this would be a specific area where French help might be avail-able, the Chief Minister said. The Union Territory Admin-istration has decided to inte-grate Oulgaret and Puduch-erry municipalities so that the smart city project could be

effectively implemented.“We have also sought the

cooperation of France in this significant project. We would soon prepare a detailed proj-ect report which would be for-warded to the Centre for its nod,” he said.

Agence Francaise de Devel-opment, the French finan-cial institution, had already expressed its readiness to pro-vide `2,100 crore for Puduch-erry to augment drinking water supply, promote sani-tation programmes and other infrastructures. This amount would be released to the Cen-tre as loan and the central gov-ernment would make it avail-able to Puducherry as grants, he said.

“Necessary agreement would be inked soon between France and the Centre to imple-ment the project,” he added.

Assam S&T Minister Keshab Mahanta calls on MoS Dr Jitendra SinghThe Minister for Science & Tech-nology, Information Technology and Water Resources, Govern-ment of Assam, Keshab Mahanta called on the Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), MoS PMO, Per-sonnel, Public Grievances, Pen-sions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh here and dis-cussed issues related to the priority projects of the Assam Government in the fields of Science & Technol-ogy and IT.

Keshab Mahanta expressed his Government’s keenness to bring Assam at par with other States of the country in terms of the application of Science & Tech-nology, remote sensing and satel-lite technology. He also said that A S Kiran Kumar, Chairman, ISRO (Indian Space Research Organ-isation) had visited Assam and discussed various applications of science in governance and devel-opment projects.

Dr Jitendra Singh explained, how in the Ministry of DoNER, he had introduced the use of satellite imaging not only for a survey of roads and building construction

but also for preparation of Utili-sation Certificates with fool-proof accuracy which not only helps in saving time but also reduces the possibility of any manipulation or manoeuvring.

Dr Jitendra Singh said that he had also suggested to Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal that the services of Assam Remote Sensing Application Center (ARSAC) should be utilised to a greater extent in the field of urban development and construction of smart cities. The NESAC (North-Eastern Space Application Centre)

in Shillong can also be asked to col-laborate with the Government’s initiatives in Guwahati, he added.

Keshab Mahanta submit-ted a memorandum for estab-lishing Regional Node/Center of Indian Institute of Remote Sens-ing (IIRS) and Indian Institute of Space Science & Technology (IIST) in Assam. Dr Jitendra Singh said that he would process this request and ask the scientists in the Department of Space to collabo-rate with the State Government for working out the feasibility of this proposal.

india and thailand to commence talks for cepa

new urban missions progress reviewed in punjab, haryana, chandigarh

urban news digest | July 2016 • 6reSilient CitieS

To make Shimla “safe, liveable and affordable,” the Shimla Municipal Corporation (SMC) has decided to fast-track the pro-cess of preparing its risk-reduc-tion master plan which involves all government agencies and individual stakeholders.

The decision has been taken to strengthen resilience in Shimla, where four studies on mapping risks of natural hazards were presented. The studies, pre-sented by the National Institute of Technology, Hamirpur, ICLEI-South Asia and Taru Leading Edge Private Limited, mapped risks of earthquakes, landslides, fire and other natural disasters to buildings and departments of the city.

Mayor of Shimla, Sanjay Chauhan said the SMC was

currently on the threshold of preparing its master plan to min-imise risks associated with disas-ters in Shimla.

“We act when a disaster strikes. Now, we have to focus on minimising risks and dam-ages associated with disasters to make the city safe and livable and affordable for residents,” he said.

Deputy Mayor Tikender Pan-war stated that they were cur-rently focusing on the odd-even formula to control traffic con-gestion and green gas emissions, setting up of community shel-ters, solar rooftops and mason-plumber capacity building for safe structures and retrofitting for unsafe buildings as recom-mended in the studies.

Additional Chief Secretary (Urban Development) Manisha

Nanda said, “We have mapped possible risks to the infrastruc-ture of the state. Being a tour-ist destination, Himachal needs an action plan for safer roads, better traffic and disaster management.”

SMC Commissioner Pan-kaj Rai and Assistant Commis-sioner Prashant Sirkek informed that the SMC would identify the 10-point action plan to miti-gate risks associated with disas-ters and put it in practice for the stakeholders concerned.

Shimla plans to have an action plan to counter disaster risks

Districts in Maharashtra to have its own disaster management planThe Maharashtra government, in anticipation of an ‘above nor-mal’ monsoon prediction by India Meteorological Depart-ment (IMD) this year, has ensured that all 36 districts in the state have their own disas-ter management plans.

The plan covers emergency and evacuation measures to be taken up in cases of heavy downpour, flash floods, land-slides, lightning strikes and other natural calamities, said state Disaster Management Department Director, Sunil Diwase.

He stated that the plans have well laid down stan-dard operation procedures for departments and agen-cies like revenue, agriculture, animal husbandry, police, paramilitary, Army, district

administration, local civic administration and others.

Almost 14 such key depart-ments have been engaged in disaster mitigation measures and each one has been allocated specific tasks to do at times of natural disasters.

“The administration through radio jingles, public advertisements and other mea-sures is informing people about how to react at times of light-ning strike, flood, hot weather conditions and other natural calamities,” Diwase said.

geo-tagged data helping to set up disaster response centres in madhya pradeshA top official has informed that the Madhya Pradesh govern-ment is using geo-tagged data of the major causes of deaths in the state to set up disaster response centres in order to rush aid to victims in the ‘golden’ first hour.

Officials of State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) and Home Guards studied the geo-tagged data collected over five years on deaths due to flood and drowning (2,500 deaths on an average annually), lightning (1,500), and snake-bite (around 2,500).

“The geo-tagged data gave us a fair idea about the concentra-tion of deaths and their spatial distribution. Accordingly, we have set up 372 disaster response centres in such areas from where our volunteers and SDRF can reach those affected as soon as possible,” said Sharan Gupt, Director General, Home Guards and SDRF, Maithili. “These 372 rescue centres also include 51 emergency operation centres at the district level.”

In geo-tagging, geographi-cal identification data is added

to various media such as maps, photographs, and videos.

Gupt, giving an example said most of the drownings were found along the course of Nar-mada and its tributaries and some picnic spots. “Accordingly, we have set up our disaster res-cue centres near such areas,” he said.

With respect to snake-bites, Gupt said 150 home guards have been trained in identifying and handling snakes, and adminis-tering basic first aid and snake anti-venom.

“We have also geo-tagged the health facilities where anti-venom is available. So whenever we get to know about a snake bite, we will send our nearest trained home guard to the vic-tim and simultaneously direct another to fetch the anti-venom, Gupt said.”

On lightning incidents, he said they have decided to do two things.

“First, we will try to make people aware about the pre-cautions they should take dur-ing thunderstorms. This will be

done specially in areas where more people have died in light-ning incidents. Second, we will try to reach out to people injured in lightning incidents, if people accompanying the person call us on 1079,” he added.

Surveillance cameras, which is a key aspect of the govern-ment’s ‘Smart Cities Project,’ alone cannot guarantee com-prehensive safety and secu-rity for citizens and must be joined together with excellent backup via big data storage, said an industry expert.

“Good quality footage captured from closed-cir-cuit cameras, irrespective of the time and tenure of foot-age, is necessary to study and plan the measures to ensure safety and security of the masses,” said Rajesh Khurana, Country Manager for India and SAARC for Seagate Technology.

“For insulating the critical video surveillance data from damage or theft, the govern-ment, like any other organisa-tion using video surveillance infrastructure, should also resort to efficient data-stor-age solution,” Khurana said in an interview.

According to 6Wresearch, a research and consulting firm, the India video surveil-lance market is projected to grow at a compounded annual

growth of over 13% between 2016 and 2022, with the mar-ket size expected to top $2.4 billion by 2020.

Khurana stated that video surveillance in India is expected to grow at an impres-sive rate given the projects like Smart Cities, for which alone the outlay is $15 billion for the upgrade of 500 and creating 100 new ones, along with the

government’s emphasis on homeland security.

“Growth of public infra-structure, increasing IT spending and security spend-ing are boosting the growth of this sector in India. All these applications of video sur-veillance create a lot of data, which needs to be stored for future analysis and monitor-ing,” Khurana added.

Surveillance for safe, smart cities needs big storage capacity: Seagate

Ministry of Environment holds the fourth workshop on climate changeThe Environment Ministry organised the fourth workshop in the series of regional consulta-tion workshops to support State governments to proactively pur-sue climate change adaptation, mitigation and building their capacity for accessing climate change finance from domestic and international sources. The workshop was organised for the eight States/Union Territo-ries of Jammu & Kashmir, Him-achal Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh. The two-day workshop was organised in Lucknow, in collaboration with National Bank for Agri-culture and Rural Development (NABARD).

The workshop has been organised to provide hands-on training to State government

officials for formulating and sub-mitting proposals for accessing climate change finance under the National Adaptation Fund for Climate Change (NAFCC), Green Climate Fund (GCF) and Adapta-tion Fund Board (AFB).

Inaugurating the workshop, Secretary, Ministry of Envi-ronment, Forest and Climate Change, Ajay Narayan Jha, high-lighted that States are impor-tant partners for implementing the climate change vision of the country and have to play a proac-tive role in project development and implementation. He further emphasised that climate change issues cannot be seen in isola-tion and require effective stake-holder engagement to pursue its goals and support the long-term implementation of climate change policies.

urban news digest | July 2016 • 7healthy CitieS

The Secretary, Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanita-tion, Parameswaran Iyer, went on a State visit to Gujarat where he met the Chief Secretary and Principal Secretary (Sanita-tion) and discussed the progress being made by the State towards achieving Open Defecation Free (ODF) status.

The State Principal Secretary, Sanitation, Jayanti Ravi, apprised the Central team about various initiatives being taken by the State in this regard. The State has achieved a sanitation coverage of 73.75%, and 4800 villages in Guja-rat have declared themselves as ODF. This has been achieved through a strong emphasis on

behaviour change training, the involvement of Self Help Groups and involving various Develop-ment partners like World Bank, UNICEF and Tata Trusts closely.

An exhibition showcasing various innovative IEC (Infor-mation-Education-Communi-cation)/Interpersonal tools was organised by the State on the occasion. The State also made a presentation highlighting the State strategy. Inter-Departmen-tal convergence came up as an important tool being deployed. Special focus was given during the discussion to capacity build-ing in community approaches. It was decided that 20 virtual classrooms would be set up by

the State to further support this purpose. The state presented a detailed plan of identifying and training motivators up to the vil-lage level.

The Secretary later met with the Chief Secretary of Gujarat, G R Aloria, and held a video con-ference with all District Develop-ment Officers (DDOs) of Gujarat. The districts expressed the read-iness of plan and effort to achieve Swachhta soon.

The Secretary concluded by emphasising that Swachh Bharat is a programme of behavioural change and while we should do it in a campaign mode, we will have to keep a focus on quality and sustainability.

4,800 villages in Gujarat declared Open Defecation Free

The Government of Bihar, as part of a focused strategy to step up Sanitation efforts in the State under the Swachh Bharat Mission, held a work-shop on Sanitation for all Dis-trict Collectors of the State. The Secretary, Union Min-istry of Drinking Water and Sanitation, Parameswaran Iyer, was present at the work-shop to offer guidance from the Government of India.

Addressing the work-shop, the Secretary expressed his happiness that the State had organised this workshop and appre-ciated the fact that leader-ship in Bihar, at all levels, is putting a lot of empha-sis on the Swachh Bharat

programme. The Collectors, in particular, are devoting significant time and atten-tion to sanitation, he said, adding that many districts such as Sitamarhi, Darb-hanga, Khagaria, Viashali, Gopalganj, Jehanabad, West Champaran are now accel-erating the Swachh Bharat Mission implementation in their districts.

The workshop also included deliberations on various issues, such as insti-tutional arrangements, pro-cesses, human and social capital requirement, stream-lining fund flow, integration with health and other inter-ventions, mechanisms for ODF verification etc.

PM’s Swachh Bharat Mission has brought big change in people’s attitude: Rajnath SinghThe Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh has said that a big transformation has happened in the country in the last two years of the Central Government. He was addressing on the occasion of project launch of collection and transportation of munici-pal solid waste (Central Zone, Delhi).

The Home Minister said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched Swachh Bharat campaign on October 2, 2014, on the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, which has resulted in the change of peo-ple’s attitude towards cleanli-ness. When the Prime Minister wielded the broom, he under-lined that all citizens should

contribute to the cleanliness campaign.

Rajnath Singh said that the recycling of waste not only helps make cities cleaner but also marks a new social revolution. He expressed happiness over the activities taken by South Delhi Municipal Corporation which can set an example before

the whole of India. He said that the project not only aims at col-lecting the garbage from door to door, but also segregating the garbage. He said that the project will help in making the Swachh Bharat Campaign of Prime Min-ister a success in Delhi. It will make Delhi clean and beautiful, he added.

Bihar to step up sanitation efforts as part of Swachh Bharat

A student wins prize for a waterless toilet design for Indian RailwaysA student of Manipal Univer-sity, Vinod Anthony Thomas, has won the second prize for designing a waterless and odourless toilet for the Indian Railways.

In keeping with the Clean India initiative, the railways held a public competition for waterless and odourless toi-lets in trains. The contest was to design such toilets for oper-ation and maintenance.

A tenth-semester student of Faculty of Architecture (FOA) in Manipal University, Vinod participated in the competi-tion organised by Research Designs and Standards Organ-isation, Lucknow. Ten entries were shortlisted.

The design by Vinod was adjudged the second best and he bagged the `75,000 prize money. The second place was also shared by another designer, Rahul Garg and teammate Saurabh Hans.

Vinod’s toilet design does away with the unhygienic problem of disposal of human

waste on the tracks. His proj-ect also makes mentions that the existing model of toilets is not subjected to effective flush-ing, which results in the accu-mulation of dirt and therefore the foul smell.

The design by Vinod intro-duces a system of waste man-agement that prevents gen-eration of foul smell and replaces the system of flush-ing with water by a conveyor system carrying waste in a

hermetically sealed pocket to a large collection bin to store waste and is run manually by a crank wheel.

The bin has been designed to reduce the amount of waste by way of decomposition and forced ventilation (evaporation of water).

Nishant H Manapure, Director, Faculty of Archi-tecture, said that Vinod has brought laurels to Manipal University.

Indian Railways has set a tar-get to install bio-toilets in all coaches to guarantee the entire rail network as zero discharge zones by 2019.

“Our target was to install bio-toilets in all our coaches by 2021. But now we have advanced it to 2019,” said Rail-way Board Chairman AK Mital.

As per the action plan, rail-ways would install 1.40 lakh bio-toilets in about 55,000 coaches in the next three years. So far, railways has installed about 37,000 bio-toilets in

coaches.In addition, it would ensure

environment-friendly dis-posal of all kinds of waste being generated in the rail premises while setting up waste to energy plants at major stations.

Currently, railways has about 32 water recycling plants and is generating about 12 mil-lion water per day.

“Our target is to reach 200 million litres per day by setting up more such plants at major stations in the coming years,” Mital said.

All railway coaches to have bio-toilets by 2019

8 URBAN NEWS DIGEST | JUly 2016hEALthy CItIES

Water ATMs, a coin-operated machine that sells a litre of clean drinking water for two rupees, has been installed in Kolkata. The water ATM is part of a pilot for a government project to put up such ATMs in rural areas.

The water ATM has been installed at Ekdalia Park in South Kolkata.

“In summer we feel very thirsty and we cannot carry so much water. But here we can pay just `2 and even share a bottle of mineral water,” said a homemaker.

Water ATMs have already been around in Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Karna-taka, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh. But the big differ-ence in Bengal is the focus on

rural areas. The German made machines would make sure the water is fluoride and arsenic free, a basic necessity which is often a luxury for many.

Minister for Public Health Engineering Subrata Mukher-jee said, “70% of medical suf-fering is due to bad water or contaminated water. We want everyone to get the best quality of water. This scheme is mainly for the rural people. But for the pilot project, to create aware-ness, we are starting with 50 units.”

Water AtMs installed in kolkata Swachh Bharat cleanliness drive observed in KeralaAs part of Swachh Bharat Mission, a two-week-long cleanliness drive was observed at government offices and autonomous insti-tutions in Kerala.

State Minister for Health and Social Justice K K Shai-laja inaugurated the drive by cleaning the premises of the state secretariat in Thiruvana-nthapuram. The minister also read out a cleanliness pledge to officials.

A number of officials, which included the general

administration secretary K R Jyothilal, took part in the event.

The urban development ministry had recently sent a letter to the state general administration department seeking to implement waste recycling system in all gov-ernment institutions in the state to ensure scientific waste management.

Additionally, the letter asked the authorities to ensure cleanliness of surroundings and roof-tops of offices.

Indo-EU Water4crops project completes 4 yearsMinister of State for the Min-istry of Science & Technol-ogy and Earth Sciences, Y S Chowdary, chaired the inaugu-ral session of the Review and Planning Meeting on the com-pletion of 4 years of the €9 mil-lion Indo-EU ‘Water4crops’ project, which was held in New Delhi recently. The proj-ect has been co-funded by Gov-ernment of India through the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) under the Ministry of Science & Technology and the European Union. The project integrates bio-treated waste-water reuse with enhanced water-use efficiency to support the Green Economy in EU and India.

The rationale behind devel-oping Decentralised Wastewa-ter Treatment (DWT) is water scarcity. On one hand, direct use of wastewater in agricul-ture is not good for farmers and consumers and on the other, disposal of untreated waste-water pollutes the environ-ment. Moreover, all localities do not have sewage treatment plants. Hence the ‘Water-4Crops’ project provides an opportunity to efficiently uti-lise low-quality industrial, domestic and municipal waste-water by facilitating the devel-opment of various technologies

for wastewater treatment at the local scale and its feasible use in agriculture.

Based on pilot studies at ICRISAT headquarters in Hyderabad and elsewhere, several watersheds have been supported by the Government of Karnataka’s Bhoo Samrudhi and Rythu Kosam programmes and by some Corporates under their Corporate Social Respon-sibility (CSR) programmes. The Decentralised Wastewater Treatment (DWT) approach is being implemented and popu-larised at 28 sites in the Indian states of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, and Karnataka.

As a result of this initiative, the chemical and biological oxygen demand in wastewaters has reduced by 30-92%. More-over, crop yield evaluations

have shown increased yields of the order of 14 to 40% for crops like okra, brinjal and chilly irri-gated with treated wastewater as compared to fresh water. In addition to increased yields, the secondary treatment of waste water for agriculture leads to more tertiary-treated potable water being available for domestic use.

Tomasz Kozlowski, Ambas-sador of the European Union to India, said that this project is a good example of how top-level research organisations from several European coun-tries have joined forces with their counterparts in India to develop concrete solutions able to benefit both sides. We continue this collaboration with India through the EU-India Water Partnership, he added.

Indian hoteliers observed a fort-night cleanliness drive Swachh Bharat Pakhwada, announced by the Government of India’s Ministry of Corporate Affairs.

The drive elicited a strong response from hotels across Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Goa and the Union Territories of

Daman, Diu & Silvassa. Under this drive, the measures adopted ranged from setting up of long-term cleanliness and waste management programmes to short-term cleanliness activi-ties within the premises, and initiating cleanliness awareness campaigns.

“The Hotel and Restaurant Association of Western India (HRAWI) has always worked hand-in-hand with the Govern-ment whether it’s about outlin-ing a plan for tourism-friendly policies or supporting its social welfare campaigns such as Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.

This time again, the associa-tion offered its strong support to Swachh Bharat Pakhwada,” said Bharat Malkani, President, HRAWI.

The Swachh Bharat Pakh-wada launched in June included activities such as displaying placards in hotel premises sug-gesting patrons to keep their surroundings clean, hotel man-agers having dialogues with customers on the subject, plac-ing stickers outside hotel prem-ises for keeping the area litter-free, discouraging the usage of plastic bags, providing cotton napkins instead of tissue papers wherever possible among oth-ers, apart from several other cleanliness practices followed by hotels and restaurants.

Hoteliers observe Swachh Bharat Pakhwada

First high powered committee meeting on swachh bharat mission & ganga rejuvenation held The first meeting of the High Powered Committee (HPC) to strategise Communication Roadmap for Swachh Bharat and Ganga Rejuvenation was held under the Chairmanship of Minister of Information & Broadcasting, Finance & Cor-porate Affairs Arun Jaitley. The meeting was attended by Uma Bharti, Minister of Water Resources & Ganga Rejuvenation, Maneka Gan-dhi, Minister of Women and Child Development, Birender Singh Chaudhary, Minister

of Drinking Water & Sanita-tion, Smriti Irani, Minister of Human Resources Develop-ment and Col. Rajyavardhan Rathore Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting. The Secretaries of the con-cerned Ministries/Depart-ments along with senior officials were also present during the meeting.

Speaking on the occasion, Jaitley said that an integrated communication strategy incorporating key messages, tools, outreach and inno-vation would be critical for enhancing the awareness, visibility, ownership and behaviour change for the Swachh Bharat Mission and

Namami Gange. For the strat-egy to be effective further, certain key elements needed to be incorporated in the communication approach. Elaborating further, the Min-ister said that the content for the messages to be used needed to be linked with the target audience. The mes-sages for both the Missions ought to reinforce each other. For an effective outreach and impact it was critical to iden-tify the effective mass media forums for both urban and

rural areas. The Minister also highlighted the need to innovatively engage different institutions both public and private to enhance citizens’ participation. It was also dis-cussed to utilise resources of concerned stake holder Min-istries and converge them for effective impact.

The discussion also emphasised on using com-munication innovations that can bring about social and behaviour change amongst masses. The HPC shall map and monitor the communi-cation strategy and its imple-mentation for both Swachh Bharat Mission and Ganga Rejuvenation programme.

urban news digest | July 2016 • 9huMane CitieS

Under Prime Minister’s Awas Yojana (Urban), the minimum addition of 9.0 sq m of car-pet area to the existing house would be required to be eligi-ble for Central assistance under the ‘Beneficiary Led Construc-tion’ component of the housing mission.

Ministry of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation issued modified Guidelines under PMAY (Urban) to this effect to States and Union Ter-ritories for compliance while sending affordable housing proposals for enhancement of existing houses under ‘Benefi-ciary Led Construction (BLC)’ component of housing mission.

Under BLC, beneficiaries would be assisted for the con-struction of new houses and enhancement of existing houses to make them more livable. A

minimum addition of 9.0 sq m of carpet to the existing pucca or semi-pucca house shall now be ensured for being eligible for Central assistance of `1.50 lakh per beneficiary. This enhance-ment shall include pucca con-struction of at least one hab-itable room or room with

kitchen/bathroom/toilet as per the National Building Construc-tion Norms.

The new Guidelines also mandated that after the required minimum of 9.0 sq m carpet area enhancement, total carpet area shall not be less than 21 sq m and must not be more than 30 sq m.

Minimum addition of 9 sq m carpet area required under urban housing mission

LPG connection distributed to women from BPL households under PMUy Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan launched Pradhan Mantri Ujj-wala Yojana (PMUY) at Faiz-abad in UP and distributed 25 LPG connections to Women from BPL families in the presence of Minister of State, Drinking Water & Sanitation, Ram Kripal Yadav; Member of Lok Sabha Faizabad, Lallu Singh; and Member of Parlia-ment, Ambedkar Nagar, Dr Hari Om Pandey.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched the Prad-han Mantri Ujjwala Yojana at Balia, to provide five crore LPG connections to Below Poverty Line (BPL) families during the next three financial

years. PMUY has been subse-quently launched in the states of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan & Uttarakhand, marking another step in the direction of providing LPG connections to over five crores Below Poverty Line (BPL) families.

With 2016 being declared as the ‘Year of Consumers’, the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas has ensured that Oil Marketing Com-panies offer customer-cen-tric offerings like Sahaj - the online booking and release of new connections, Online booking and payment for LPG refills, ‘1906’- 24x7 LPG leakage Emergency telephone helpline, to name a few.

No discrimination in housing sanctions to states, asserts NaiduThe central government has asserted that there is no dis-crimination in sanctioning housing projects for the ben-efit of urban poor under the Prime Minister’s Awas Yojana (Urban). Minister of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation M Venkaiah Naidu during his reply to the discussion in the Lok Sabha on the Demands for Grants for 2016-17 of the Minis-try of HUPA, ruled out any dis-crimination against some states, stating that States have been empowered to appraise and approve such projects and the centre only does broad scrutiny.

In support of his assertion in this regard, Venkaiah Naidu

informed the House of state-wise proposals received under PMAY (Urban) were approved by his Ministry as it is. He said, “If some states do proper home-work, prepare and approve projects at the level of Chief Secretary, my Ministry can’t put them on hold as there is a huge target for construction of houses for urban poor. Andhra Pradesh and Telangana fell in this category.”

Referring to an observation made by a Member of Karna-taka, Naidu informed that the State Government sent propos-als for 16,522 houses only and they were approved.

Referring to the Real Estate

(Regulation and Development) Act, 2016 Naidu said that model Rules under the Act will soon be announced by his Ministry. He warned of strict action against malpractices and cheating of buyers in the context of several complaints coming from differ-ent places.

Driven by the central govern-ment’s focus to boost growth and reduce regulatory hurdles, India has moved up in JLL and LaSalle Investment Manage-ment’s Global Real Estate Trans-parency Index (GRETI) 2016.

“Improved market funda-mentals, policy reforms like Land Acquisition Act, liberalisa-tion of foreign direct investment (FDI) into the realty sector, and strengthening of information in public domain along with

digitisation of land records and opening up of real estate invest-ment trusts (REITs) were main influencers in the India rank-ing,” said Anuj Puri Chairman & Country Head, JLL India.

The study suggested Tier I and Tier II Indian cities have the potential to break into the ‘Transparent’ set of countries from their current status of being ‘Semi-Transparent’ mar-kets. Tier-I cities in India ranked 36th in transparency levels,

followed by Tier II and III (cit-ies) at 39th and 52nd positions, respectively.

“Out of 109 countries, the Top 10 that are identified as ‘Highly Transparent’ alone account for 75% of global invest-ment into commercial real estate, highlighting the extent to which transparency drives real estate investment deci-sions. The Top 10 countries are followed by 20 ‘Transparent’, 37 ‘Semi-Transparent’, 21 ‘Low Transparency’ and 21 ‘Opaque’ countries. While India has a long way to get into the ulti-mate tier of ‘Highly Trans-parent’ markets, its Tier I cit-ies look poised to break into the ‘Transparent’ set of coun-tries from their current status of being ‘Semi-Transparent’ markets. This bodes well for the economy and investment scenario,” stated the study.

Government push helps India move up in real estate transparency ranking

moud slashes land rates for health institutions and orphanagesThe Urban Development Ministry has slashed land rates for health institutions, maternity centres, night shel-ters and orphanages to a ‘No Profit No Loss rate’ of Re 1, and has also reduced prices of land for DTC depots, and government offices.

“The Urban Develop-ment Ministry has approved minimum rates of premium Delhi Development Author-ity (DDA) land allocated to public institutions such as health, transport and schools. Land for health ser-vices such as hospitals, and

dispensaries to be set up by the central and Delhi gov-ernment will be charged at a nominal Re 1 per annum,” said Venkaiah Naidu, Min-ster for Urban Development.

“Land for DTC bus depots and DTC offices have been reduced to one-tenth the original commercial mar-ket rates, ranging between `6,72,000 per sq m and `1,82,400 per sq m. They have been reduced to the new ‘No Profit No Loss rate’ of `11,745 per sq m. This will help the Delhi government,” said Naidu.

urban news digest | July 2016 • 10green CitieS

Ministry of New and Renewable Energy is implementing a pro-gramme to promote the installa-tion of Small Wind Energy and Hybrid Systems (SWES) with the objective to provide elec-tricity in unelectrified areas or areas with intermittent electric supply. The first such Pilot-cum- demonstration project of 25 KW capacity would be installed at the wind turbine test station of National Institute of Wind Energy at Kayathar, Tootikudi District, Tamil Nadu.

Under the programme, MNRE provides Central Finan-cial Assistance (CFA) to com-munity users for installation of such systems. The total installed capacity as on March 31, 2016 is 2.69 MW. There are 6 small wind turbine manufacturers and 9

models empanelled under this programme.

The SWES projects have been highly successful in the USA and European countries. Initially, 10 such demonstration projects would be supported for grid integration. The tentative cost for each of the project would be in the range of `2-3 lakh per

KW, depending upon the config-uration and location of the proj-ects. The Ministry would sup-port up to 50% of the project cost.

The installation of such projects and its success would lead towards the launching of National Programme on Grid connected small wind and solar hybrid system in future.

SWES to provide electricity to unelectrified areas

Mumbai Metro One plans to install solar panels on 12 stationsMumbai Metro One has announced plans to install rooftop solar panels on all 12 stations on the 11 km Ver-sova-Andheri-Ghatkopar corridor, operated by it, as well as in depot areas.

“The rooftop solar pan-els will be installed at four locations in its depot and at all the 12 stations. The entire solar power gener-ating system will have an installed capacity of 2.3 MW, out of which about 2 MW will be produced from the rooftop installations at stations and remaining from the panels set up at the depot,” the company said in a statement.

The company would also install light-emitting diode (LED) lighting at metro

stations, depot, and admin-istrative buildings to reduce its electricity consumption.

“The electricity gener-ated from the solar pan-els will be utilised for non-traction use in activities like lighting, air-condi-tioning and maintenance,” it said.

The work of setting up rooftop solar panels would begin soon and take about six months to complete.

EESL distributes LED bulbs under UJALA scheme across 16 statesThe LED bulbs under Gov-ernment of India’s ‘Unnat Jyoti by Affordable LEDs for All’ (UJALA) scheme are being distributed across 16 states in the country in the price range of `75-95. The project, executed by Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL), under the administra-tion of Ministry of Power, pro-cures high-quality LED bulbs from leading manufacturers

through a transparent bid-ding process.

EESL has pooled the prices of all the previous procure-ments since 2014 and the passed on the direct benefit to the consumers across states. Various state-specific taxes and other administrative costs like distribution, awareness, etc are added to the pooled procurement price. There-fore, the cost of the LED bulb

has been brought down to a price range of `75 - `95, after addition of administrative costs, distribution and aware-ness cost.

The Government has ensured transparency and encouraged competition by using e-procurement of goods and services. This has resulted in significant reduction in transaction cost and time and enhanced process efficiency.

Piyush Goyal, Minister of State (IC) for Power, Coal, New and Renewable Energy released NTPC Book on bio-diversity ‘The Good Earth’ and planted a sapling along with students to commem-orate Environment Day at a function held in Noida. Speaking on the occasion he said Indian economy shall grow by leaps and bound and so would NTPC ful-filling the aspirations of all Indians. The mission of the present government is to increase use of clean tech-nologies and renewable for power generation making Clean India Energy Capital of the world. He also empha-sised on the need to restore the forest cover depleted over a period of time through massive tree plantation. He urged NTPC to increase its tree plantation target and keep a proper record reflect-ing ownership of the activity.

Goyal said NTPC has suc-cessfully demonstrated its ability to deliver large proj-ects and producing power in an efficient reliable and

affordable manner. He said that the power sector in India is focusing on envi-ronment sustainability and NTPC has taken a lead by preserving flora and fauna in and around its power sta-tions. The book released captures the long-term efforts of NTPC in the direc-tion and shall be an inspira-tion for all corporate to care for the environment.

He congratulated NTPC family on its 4670 MW

largest power station Vind-hyachal achieving 100.05% PLF generating 114 MUs in a day.

In his address, Gurdeep Singh, CMD said that NTPC is deeply committed to envi-ronmental sustainability and has taken many initia-tives for its betterment. The company is focused on miti-gating the impact of its oper-ations and pursues progres-sive environment systems and practices.

India poised to become clean energy capital of the world: Piyush Goyal

India, U.S. set up financial assistance for India’s clean energy initiativesIndia and the U.S. announced the setting up of two finan-cial assistance programmes worth $60 million for support-ing India’s clean energy initia-tives including solar power and other renewables.

“The United States is com-mitted to bring to bear its technical capacity, resources and private sector, and is jointly launching with India new efforts, to spur greater investment in India’s renew-able energy sector, includ-ing efforts that can serve as a model for other ISA Member Countries,” said the White House.

The announcement came

after the meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and U.S. President Barack Obama in the Oval Office.

This includes a creation of a $20 million US-India Clean Energy Finance (USICEF) initiative, supported equally by the United States and India.

This is expected to mobil-ise up to $400 million to pro-vide clean and renewable electricity to up to one million households by 2020. The two leaders also agreed on a $40 million US-India Catalytic Solar Finance Programme that would be supported equally by the United States and India.

URBAN NEWS DIGEST | jUly 2016 11 GrEEn CItIES

India played an important role in the global renewable energy development in 2015, with the country being ranked among the top five nations in new investments and in the top four as regards creating jobs in the green energy sector.

According to a report by the Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century (Ren21) China led by more than double the investment of the next largest investor, the U.S., followed by Japan, the UK, and India. While China, the U.S., Japan and the UK maintained their positions similar to 2014, India moved up to displace Ger-many, which saw a sharp drop in investment.

During 2015, India’s invest-ments in renewable energy sector increased to $10.2 bil-lion, compared to $8.3 billion in 2014. The new investments saw growth for the second consecu-tive year, supported by a jump in

utility-scale solar power financ-ing, which reached $4.6 billion, up 75% over the previous year – a direct result of the Indian gov-ernment’s increased focus on renewable energy.

In addition, $4.1 billion of asset finance was invested in wind power, an increase of 17% from 2014. Record capac-ity-addition also led to strong growth in new jobs. Consider-ing all renewable energy tech-nologies, the leading employers in 2015 were China, Brazil, the U.S. and India.

The calendar year of 2015

saw considerable activity in the Indian solar and wind power markets as the renew-able energy targets were trans-lated into concrete policy frameworks. Central and State auctions for solar PV contrib-uted to the installation of 2 GW and to an impressive pipeline of 23 GW. Employment in solar PV expanded by 23% in 2015, and jobs in the wind sector also rose.

India installed about 2.6 GW, surpassing Spain’s capac-ity to rank fourth globally for total wind power capacity, with nearly 25.1 GW in 2015.

India among top five green energy markets in 2015, says report

Small hydropower projects to be promoted in Arunachal PradeshThe NITI Aayog, boosting Arunachal Pradesh govern-ment’s plan to develop small hydropower projects to pro-vide electricity on a priority basis, has agreed that proj-ects up to 100 MW could soon be promoted and taken up as small hydropower projects under Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE).

Amitabh Kant, Aayog’s CEO disclosed this during a meeting with Chief Minister Kalikho Pul in New Delhi.

The CM had sought the support of the planning body to assist in developing the state’s untapped hydropower potential.

To improve the

development of small hydro-power in the state, Pul advo-cated that the process of obtaining various clearances for the projects be sped up and even made it into a single win-dow clearance system.

Pointing out the impact of basin studies on the feasibility of small projects on river trib-utaries, he observed that such studies resulted in a delay in implementation of the projects in spite of clearances obtained from CEA and MoEF & CC.

He reiterated that the proj-ects proposed to be dropped as an outcome of Basin Study should be avoided as it may generate ill will and hamper future projects.

Higher wind generation raises output from renewable energy Over the last one year, the rise in wind power generation capacity by 3,000 MW has helped raise electricity generation from the renewable energy sources to new highs in 2016-17.

As per data from the National Load Dispatch Centre, on May 24, 2016 almost 21% or 650 mil-lion units of the country’s total electricity demand of 3,127 mil-lion units was met through the wind and hydro energy.

Between April – May 25, 2016, the wind and hydro power plants generated 23,066 million units across the country while the nationwide electricity demand met was at 1,83,143 million units.

The capacity of wind power has increased to 26,866.66 MW as on April 30, compared with 23,444 MW last year.

Falling hydropower gener-ation meant that the share of

wind and hydro in the coun-try’s total electricity mix has remained at 12.5% between April-May. Data from the pre-vious two years indicates that towards the last week of May, the contribution of hydro-power and wind power to the total electricity demand typi-cally spiked to around 19-20%.

“Typically, this the pre-monsoon time in the southern

and western region which is why there is a spike in hydro-power and wind power gen-eration. This year, wind has been higher but hydropower generation has slipped which has meant that the overall con-tribution of renewable energy sources has remained at tradi-tional levels,” an official at the National Load Dispatch Cen-tre said.

The Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has granted ex-post facto approval to the MoU between India and Japan for promoting sustainable, stable and low-car-bon thermal power develop-ment in India.

The signing of the MoU would help India to address issues and barriers in promot-ing sustainable, stable and low-carbon thermal power development that have been identified through the preced-ing Pre-Primary Study and the

on-going cooperation towards Energy Efficient Renovation & Modernisation as well as new power development, by means of diagnostic activities to sup-port Renovation and Moderni-sation (R&M) materialisation and implementation, knowl-edge and technology exchange activities to support Clean Coal Technology (CCT) for ther-mal power plants such as Ultra Super Critical (USC) and other environmental technologies, all of which would be conducive to overall power development for India as well as to facilitate rele-vant policy implementation.

Cabinet gives approval to MoU between India & Japan for promoting sustainable power development

states agree to provide 24x7 power to all households by may 2017Union Power Minister Piy-ush Goyal said all the States have resolved to provide 24x7 power to all households by May 2017, which is around a year ahead of the target set by the Prime Minister.

Addressing a press con-ference at the end of a two-

day meeting of Power Minis-ters, Goyal said all the States, excluding those affected by leftwing extremism, have also resolved to electrify all remain-ing unelectrified villages and States would soon award con-tracts in the for this work.

The States have also resolved to make sure that operational and financial milestones in the memoran-dum of understanding for Ujwal Discom Assurance Scheme (UDAY) would be implemented.

All States have agreed to secure henceforth only smart meters that are tamper proof

and communication-enabled.The minister said the cost

of smart meters has been brought down by 60% from `8,000 to `3,223 as a result of Central procurement and the endeavour is to go for only such meters in the future for all the 25 crore consumers in

the country.The Minister also said that

a 4-digit all-India number (1921) has been fixed for con-sumer complaints across the country.

The meeting also discussed hydropower policy and sought to work out ways of reviving small (25 MW or less) stalled hydro projects with cooper-ation from the States to pro-vide a new thrust to the hydro sector.

He stated that a committee for this has been set up which would submit its recommen-dations by the end of Septem-ber this year.

12 URBAN NEWS DIGEST | jUly 2016 GrEEn CItIES

The state government of Delhi has came out with an ambitious policy announcing incentives and tax breaks to promote solar power, making it mandatory for government and public insti-tutions to install rooftop solar panels.

Finalised at a cabinet meet-ing chaired by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, the solar pol-icy aims to make Delhi a ‘solar city’ through generation of 1,000 megawatt of power by 2020 and taking it further to 2,000 MW by 2025.

No approval would be required from Municipal Cor-poration or other urban devel-opment bodies concerned like DDA for putting up solar plants including any additional system for monitoring the performance of solar plant in existing or new buildings.

“Making Delhi a solar city is one of our 70-point agenda. This policy which is very progressive will help in providing clean and

green energy,” said Kejriwal.The policy outlined a combi-

nation of regulations, mandates, incentives, and tax breaks for the growth of rooftop solar power in the capital.

The policy authorises deploy-ment of solar plants on all gov-ernment-owned rooftops in the next five years, which requires private power distribution com-panies to meet at least 75% of their solar renewable purchase obligation (RPO) within Delhi.

Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Management Centre (EE&REM) of Power

department would be the nodal agency answerable for effective implementation of this policy in consultation with the state gov-ernment, eligible consumers, the central government, other states and different stakeholders.

To support solar plants on rooftops of buildings which cannot consume all of the energy generated locally, dis-coms would assist group net metering whereby surplus energy exported to the grid can be adjusted in any other elec-tricity service connection of the consumer.

Government unveils policy to make Delhi a Solar City

India sets solar energy target of 100 GW by 2022Under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission, the Centre has approved the pro-posal to boost the country´s solar power capacity target to achieve 100 GW by 2022. This target has been divided into 40 GW from the rooftop and 60 GW through Large and Medium Scale Grid Connected Solar Power Projects. This mis-sion requires an overall invest-ment of ̀ 600,000 crore.

The Mission has set an ambitious target of deploying 20,000 MW of grid-connected solar power by 2022 and has envisaged to achieve grid tar-iff parity.

India has also announced that it would ensure about 40% of its electricity comes from non-fossil fuel sources, with a major share of this to come from solar power.

“It is a good opportunity for solar panel producers because

they will get a good market. It is very good for the consumers as well, because they can gener-ate during the daytime and use net-off facility. So, whatever he generates, the bill gets adjusted accordingly,” says Mahesh D Paranjpe, Chief Hydro Renew-able Operations and Safety, Tata Power.

Power Minister Piyush Goyal said, “We are looking at achieving the 100 GW target of installed capacity of solar energy by the end of 2017 itself.”

Earlier this year, the country´s grid-connected solar power generation capacity crossed the 5,000 MW mark, with Rajasthan, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh leading solar the power adoption.

For 2015-16, solar power capacity addition target has been set at 1,400 MW, and 1,489 MW capacity was added by the end of January of this year.

World Bank to provide $1 billion for India’s solar missionThe World Bank has announced plans to provide more than $1 bil-lion to support India’s solar ini-tiatives. An agreement to this effect was signed when World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim met Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Power Minister Piy-ush Goyal in New Delhi.

“The World Bank-sup-ported projects under prepara-tion include solar rooftop tech-nology, infrastructure for solar parks, bringing innovative solar and hybrid technologies to mar-ket and transmission lines for solar-rich states,” said a state-ment from the World Bank.

A $625-million agreement was signed for a grid-connected rooftop solar programme. The project would finance the instal-lation of at least 400MW of solar photovoltaic installations which would provide clean, renewable

energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by displacing ther-mal generation.

The World Bank Group would also work together with the 121-member International Solar Alliance, headquartered in India, with the aim of attract-ing $1 trillion in investments by 2030 to promote solar energy worldwide.

The World Bank Group, as part of the agreement with the ISA, would develop a roadmap to mobilise financing for develop-ment and deployment of afford-able solar energy and also work with other multilateral develop-ment banks and financial institu-tions to develop financing instru-ments to support solar energy development.

Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh N Chandrababu Naidu has launched the ‘National Pro-gramme on Energy Efficiency

Fans’ at Narsapur town in West Godavari district.

The State Energy Conser-vation Mission informed these

energy efficient fans are to be distributed to consumers at an upfront price of `1,173 each as against the market price of about ̀ 1750 each.

“Consumers can also avail an instalment facility and pay a monthly instalment of `60 for two years. A domestic con-sumer can purchase two fans while commercial consumers can purchase ten fans and other institutional or industrial con-sumers may purchase up to 50 fans,” it added.

At the same function, Naidu launched the distribution of LED bulbs to SC/ST consum-ers in the state at ̀ 10 a bulb.

energy efficient fan distribution programme launched in andhra pradesh

Government unveils scheme for setting up 1,000 MW Wind Power ProjectMinistry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has launched scheme for setting up of 1000 MW Wind Power Project con-nected to transmission net-work of Central Transmis-sion Utility (CTU) with an

objective to facilitate the supply of wind power to the non-windy states at a price discovered through a transparent bidding pro-cess. Ministry has desig-nated Solar Energy Cor-poration of India (SECI) as the nodal agency for imple-mentation of the scheme.

The Scheme would encourage competitiveness through scaling up of proj-ect sizes and introduction

of efficient and transpar-ent e-bidding and e-auc-tioning processes. It would also facilitate fulfillment of Non-Solar Renewable Pur-chase Obligation (RPO) requirement of non-windy states.

The Government of India has set an ambitious target of achieving 175 GW power capacity from renewable energy resources by 2022 and out of this 60 GW has to come from wind power. The Scheme would be imple-mented for setting up 1000 MW capacity of CTU con-nected Wind Power Proj-ects by Wind Project Devel-opers on the build, own and operate basis.

urban news digest | July 2016 • 13ConneCted CitieS

Union Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu has announced a collab-oration between the Centre and the Maharashtra government for several projects, which includes elevated corridors between Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) and Panvel and Church-gate and Virar in the city.

The Railway Ministry and the state Government would form a Special Purpose Vehicle on 50:50 partnership for this project.

“It has been decided to speed up all the required procedures between both governments and the project work should start by August 15 for fast elevated corri-dors between CST-Panvel, Ban-dra and Virar, and the installa-tion of Communication-Based Train Control (CBTC) between CST and Panvel,” Prabhu said.

The corridor between

Churchgate and Bandra would come in the second phase.

A joint venture known as the ‘Maharashtra Railway Infra-structure Development Com-pany’ would also be formed to complete nine projects worth `23,000 crore in the state in four years.

“These include Ahmed-nagar-Beed-Parli-Vaijnath, Wardha-Nanded (via Yavat-mal-Pusad), Manmad-Indore,

Gadchandur-Adilabad, Pune-Nashik, Kolhapur-Vaibhavwadi and Baramati-Lonand railway lines and Wadsa-Desaiganj-Aar-mori-Gadchiroli-Nagpur-Nagb-hir guage conversion,” he added.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said soon there would be an integration of ticketing system in Mumbai for the (suburban) railway, (municipal) BEST buses and shared taxis.

Elevated corridors announced for Mumbai local trains

cabinet approves of 4-6 laning of kharar-ludhiana section of nh-95The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs, chaired by Prime Minister Naren-dra Modi has approved the development of 4/6 laning of Kharar-Ludhiana Sec-tion of NH-95 (New NH-05) in Punjab.

The cost is estimated to be ̀ 2069.70 crore including the cost of land acquisition, resettlement, rehabilitation and other pre-construction activities. The total length of the road to be developed is approximately 76 km.

This work would be done under the National Highways Development Project (NHDP) Phase-V in Hybrid Annuity Mode.

The project would help in accelerating the improvement of infra-structure in Punjab and in reducing the time and cost of travel for traffic, partic-ularly heavy traffic, plying between Kharar and Lud-hiana section. The develop-ment of this stretch would also help in uplifting the socio-economic condition of this region in the State.

The Sub-project (Kharar-Ludhiana) is part of the project of Chandigarh-Ludhiana, which has been divided in two sections i.e. Chan-digarh-Kharar and Kharar-Ludhiana.

Maharashtra invites firm from Malaysia to invest in road projectsMaharashtra government held a discussion with the Malay-sian firm Construction Indus-try Development Board (CIDB) Holdings on ways to increase collaboration for Nagpur-Mumbai Super Communica-tion Expressway and other road projects.

A delegation from the com-pany recently met Chief Min-ister Devendra Fadnavis in Mumbai.

“It was a pleasure to meet the Indian Ambassadors and High Commissioners to 10 nations as part of annual HoM Con-ference 2016. Prime Minister Modi believes that India lives in states. So such interactions are very important for present-ing strengths of our states to the world,” Fadnavis said.

The Chief Minister stated that he shared Maharashtra’s growth story, reforms, speedy

governance, immense opportu-nities and the role HoMs could play in accelerating the growth of the state with the visiting dignitaries.

“Lately, many investors are experiencing unimagina-ble speed of Maharashtra gov-ernment along with the trans-parent and efficient way of working,” said Fadnavis, add-ing that he discussed ways to increase collaboration for

Nagpur-Mumbai Super Com-munication Expressway and few other road projects.

“We had a very good meet-ing with Malaysian delegation of CIDB holdings,” he added.

Minister of Railways Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu inau-gurated five new activities namely (i) New AC Weekly Express train between H Niza-muddin-Pune, (ii) Expansion of VIKALP Scheme of Alter-nate Train Reservation to Delhi-Howrah, Delhi- Chen-nai, Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi-Secunderabad Circuits, (iii) Pilot Project of Sale of Unre-served Tickets through Hand Held Terminals, (iv) Launch-ing of Ergonomically Rede-signed & Optimised Tools for Track Gangs, Keymen & Patrol-men and (v) Pilot Project for Improving Safety at Unmanned Level Crossing

Minister of Railways inau-gurated the following activi-ties through video conferenc-ing from Mumbai.

Additionally, as a part of the Rail Budget Announce-ments of 2016-17, Suresh Prab-hkar Prabhu in a programme held at Rail Bhawan inaugu-rated three important activ-ities namely (i) Extension of newly introduced cancella-tion facility for PRS counter tickets through 139 or IRCTC

website for all confirmed, RAC and waitlisted PRS Counter tickets, (ii) Release of Hand-out on ‘Railway initiatives for Ease of Doing Business’ and Nomination of ‘Key Customer Managers,’ (iii) Flagging off of Roll-On-Roll-Off(Ro-Ro) train Ex-Bihta to Turki in Bihar.

Indian Railways has been working to ensure moderni-sation of Railways, safety and security of passengers, improved passenger ameni-ties, reduced expenditure, tech-nological solutions etc. In this direction, Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu also launched five ser-vices which include, (i) Making

catering optional in identified Trains (Shatabdi & Rajdhani), (ii) Announcement for Initia-tion of ‘Janani Sewa’ – i.e. Hot Milk, Hot Water and Baby Food items at stations and children’s menu items on Trains, (iii) Release of Brochure on ‘Pas-senger Business Initiatives,’(iv) The release of Photo-Write- up on ‘Rail Hamsafar Saptaah’, (v) Inauguration of Passenger amenities of Western Railway through remote- a) Homing Platform at Bandra Terminus Station, b) One Escalator and a booking office at Kandivali Sta-tion, c) Two Escalators at Gore-gaon Station.

Minister of Railways launches various passenger friendly initiatives

Delhi-Kolkata bullet train journey to be less than 5 hoursA firm commissioned by the Railways has suggested that travelling time between Delhi and Kolkata would be cut down to as less as five hours by oper-ating a bullet train on the route.

A senior Railway Min-istry official informed that the feasibility study is being undertaken for the 1513 km long Delhi-Kolkata high-speed corridor along with two other routes of the Diamond

Quadrilateral project, which would connect four metro cit-ies through high-speed rail network.

As per the feasibility report by the Spanish firm, the travel time between Delhi and Kolkata on the proposed bul-let train would take 4 hours 56 minutes as against the 17 hours in Rajdhani, the official said.

The final report is set to be submitted by the year end.

14 URBAN NEWS DIGEST | JUly 2016COnnECtED CItIES

Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) is set to run air-condi-tioned buses under Cluster Scheme in the national capital with the AAP government plan-ning to float tenders for 2,000 new AC standard-floor buses to be operated by DTC and DIMTS.

The decision by DTC would enhance public transport in the national. A proposal to float ten-ders for 2,000 AC standard-floor buses would soon be tabled at a meeting of Delhi Cabinet for its approval.

Presently, Delhi Integrated Multi-Modal Transit Sys-tem (DIMTS) operates buses through Cluster Scheme under which corporate entities are invited by the government to run their buses. Though, DTC pur-chases buses and run them on their own.

While, under cluster model concessioners are paid on kilo-metres scheme.

“Government has decided to float tenders for 2,000 AC standard-floor buses which will be operated by both DTC and DIMTS. A proposal in this regard will soon be tabled at a meeting of Cabinet to be chaired by Chief Minister Arvind Kejri-wal,” said Transport Minister of

Delhi Gopal Rai said.Rai stated that the Transport

department has been asked to float tenders once the proposal receives the Cabinet’s nod. The minister also said that the gov-ernment is contemplating to park theses buses in the DTC’s depots.

Delhi Transport Corporation to run AC Buses under Cluster Scheme

Delhi-Varanasi bullet train to cover 782 km in 2 hrs 40 mins

The second bullet train after the Mumbai-Ahmedabad cor-ridor would run from Delhi to Varanasi, a distance of 782 km which it would com-plete in just two hours and 40 minutes.

The project connecting the capital to the pilgrimage city, while passing through Luc-know has been fast-tracked by the government.

The Delhi-Varanasi stretch, part of the Delhi-Kolkata corridor has been accorded topmost priority for the railways after the national transporter accelerated the

Mumbai-Ahmedabad stretch by tying up funds with Japan and setting up of the High-Speed Rail Corporation.

An official said that the Spanish firm, which is con-ducting a feasibility study of the high-speed rail corridor, is likely to submit its final report in November.

The preliminary cost, without rolling stock, being worked out is estimated to be about `43,000 crore for the Delhi-Varanasi stretch and around `84,000 crore for the entire Delhi-Kolkata corridor.

NHAI recognises 27 corridors for providing scientific road networkNational Highways Authority of India (NHAI), as part of pro-viding a scientific road network pattern for the country, has prepared a grid of 27 horizon-tal and vertical national high-way corridors at a distance of every 250 km crisscrossing the country.

All these stretches would be of four lanes and would pro-vide more road space for seam-less transport.

The total length of these corridors, including ones such as Kanyakumari to Srinagar, Porbandar to Kolkata, Surat to Paradip Port, Rameswaram to Dehradun and Mangalore Port to Chennai Port, is about 36,600 km. Out of this about 30,100 km are already NHs but only 18,800 km of them are of four-lanes, with the rest being either single or two lanes.

The government would have

to invest about `25,000 crore for completing four-laning of the routes.

The proposed NH grid would not only improve con-nectivity in each region and state capital but would also provide highway link to 12 major ports, 45 out of 53 million plus cities and 26 state capitals besides, providing connectiv-ity to major tourist and reli-gious places.

Switzerland joins a number of countries around the world exploring the potential of elec-tric autonomous buses, with a pair of driverless shuttles ferry-ing passengers around the city of Sion as part of a two-year trial.

The buses would take to the public roads with local regula-tors eying a wider deployment of low-carbon, autonomous mass transport. The vehicles would be operated by Switzer-land’s leading public bus oper-ator, PostBus, and would nav-igate Sion’s city streets using a software developed by startup BestMile that spins out of the Swiss Federal Institute of Tech-nology in Lausanne (EPFL).

The buses have been fitted with air conditioning, a backup battery, an access ramp for the disabled and are capable of car-rying 11 passengers at a time, who would ride free of charge. The two vehicles would follow a route along the edge of the city and pass through pedestrian

areas, traveling at a top speed of 20 km/h.

In the interests of safety, an attendant would go along for the ride but the buses would be con-trolled remotely by an operator using BestMil’s autonomous driving software.

Researchers from the EPFL’s Urban Transport Systems Lab-oratory are collaborating on the two-year project, with the aim of

building a system which man-ages fleets of autonomous vehi-cles. This would involve devel-oping algorithms which enable the buses to communicate with one another and other vehicles on the road, along with accom-modating the needs of passen-gers through on-demand ser-vices, such as booking rides in advance and adjusting for flex-ible routes.

switzerland introduces autonomous buses as part of a trial

Group demands MMRDA to construct Mumbai Metro line II underground A group of NGOs and cit-izen groups (under Apna Mumbai Abhiyaan), demands the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Author-ity (MMRDA) to construct the Mumbai Metro line II underground.

The planning authority says that it would be an ele-vated corridor but the NGO group feels even though the elevated project costs less the delay in its completion, includ-ing cost escalation, shifting of

utilities, among other factors, would be a major hurdle.

The group pointed out that Andheri-Bandra is one of the most congested land masses in the world and with 7,000 sq mt of the footpath to be occu-pied by stairs, lifts and esca-lators, the group questioned whether the pavements for the same were available. It also said 32 km of sewer lines, 12.5 km water lines and 11 km of gas lines would have to be re-laid.

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urban news digest | July 2016 • 16digital CitieS

The Ministry of Urban Devel-opment is set to launch a new portal, SmartNet, to assist in the development of smart cit-ies under the government’s flagship mission.

The initiative has been aimed at developing a platform for communication among cit-ies, academia, researchers and technologists, along with cre-ating an ecosystem of learn-ing and disseminating infor-mation among city managers and stakeholders in urban transformation.

“SmartNet will become the primary portal for government to government; government to business; and business to gov-ernment linkages for the urban sector in India,” said a senior official in the Ministry, adding that it would offer real-time data for all cities.

Eventually, the ministry also wants SmartNet to become the preferred mechanism for knowledge sharing between the smart cities and cities under other missions such as AMRUT, HRIDAY, Swachch Bharat and Housing for All.

The portal would show-case benchmarked cases and best practice documentations, model RFP documents, finan-cial models and business cases,

land monetisation ideas, SPV structures and innovative prac-tices and risk mitigation tech-niques, etc.

SmartNet would also host an Open Source Software Library that would showcase apps developed during the smart city challenge phase and would highlight any new open source software being developed by mission cities during the execu-tion phase.

Centre set to launch a portal for smart cities 7 railway stations to have free Wi-Fi soonIndian Railways is set to launch free Wi-Fi service at seven more stations, including Allahabad and Sealdah.

“We will provide free Wi-Fi service in association with Google at seven more stations soon for passengers,” said a senior Railway Ministry official.

Presently, railways provide the service at eleven stations, which include Mumbai Cen-tral, Bhubaneswar, Kacheguda, Vijayawada, Raipur, Bhopal, Patna, Ranchi, Visakhapatnam, Jaipur and Guwahati.

The official said the work for providing Wi-Fi facility is underway and the stations, including Pune, Ernakulum, Lucknow, Ujjain and Gorakh-pur, would get it soon.

RailTel, a railway PSU,

supported by Google technol-ogy, is providing state-of-the-art high-speed Internet net-work at the stations for visitors and rail users.

“Our target is to provide the facility at 100 major stations in the current year,” the official stated.

The service built over the fibre network of RailTel has been designed to offer high-speed broadband-like experi-ence to any user with a mobile connection on a smartphone.

Google intends to reduce digital gender gap in IndiaGoogle has tied up with Tata Trusts in order to reduce the dig-ital gender gap in rural areas of India by giving them access to data.

“The digital gender gap in rural areas of India is vast. One out every ten women are famil-iar with the internet and other data usages,” said Sapna Chadha, head of marketing of Google India.

She stated that the pro-gramme ‘Internet Saathi’ is aimed at training women and empowering them on how to take advantage of the internet and get information on edu-cation, various government schemes, weather, crop and on other matters.

This is the first such initia-tive by Google worldwide and India was selected due to its

huge population base, informed Chadha.

Presently, there are nine states where the programme has been rolled out; with two lakh ‘Inter-net Saathis’ already trained.

Google is providing android tablets and smartphones to women along with data access.

Chadha said that the pro-gramme was adding 500 women every week.

Himachal Pradesh has become the first state in the country to have a State Data Centre (SDC), which has been designed using green data centre concept to offer 101 people-oriented ser-vices online through an inte-grated database.

Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, while launching the `58-crore SDC, said that the SDC would integrate the websites of various depart-ments and all services could be accessed through the inte-grated database, saving time and money spent on the cre-ation of infrastructure.

“It is a major green initia-tive as all services would be provided online and online

and paperless governance will become a reality,” he said.

The Chief Minister directed all government departments to make use of SDC for host-ing e-Governance applica-tions instead of creating their own infrastructure.

Further, the SDC would help the departments to roll out more government-to-cit-izen-services and people can avail them from anywhere and anytime.

“State Data Centre has been set up by IT Department using state-of-the-art technology and is first SDC in the country which has been designed using green data centre concept to minimise power requirement

and increase power utilisation efficiency,” said Additional Chief Secretary (IT) Sanjeev Gupta.

Now departmental appli-cations can be hosted cen-trally in SDC free of cost and HIMSWAN connectiv-ity could be provided in field offices to access departmental applications.

The user departments can now focus on bringing more services online and integrate the same with other depart-mental applications so that the citizen would not be asked to collect the document from one department and deposit in another department for avail-ing services, Gupta stated.

Himachal Pradesh launches green concept based State Data Centre

Portal launched to promote Net Zero Energy BuildingsMinistry of Power and the United States Agency for International Develop-ment (USAID) has launched India’s first integrated web portal designed to promote and mainstream Net Zero Energy Buildings (NZEB) in India. The portal (www.nzeb.in) was launched by Pradeep Kumar Pujari, Sec-retary, Ministry of Power, and Ambassador Jonathan Addleton, USAID Mission Director to India.

The portal provides com-plete information about Net Zero Energy Buildings – those that generate as much energy as they use – as well as how to achieve near-zero energy status through the

use of efficient lighting and equipment, integration of renewable energy technolo-gies, and best practice design strategies. In addition, the portal hosts the NZEB Alli-ance, an industry-wide body set up to drive the Indian markets toward highly energy-efficient buildings.

Speaking on the occa-sion, P K Pujari outlined his vision to mainstream Net Zero Energy Buildings in India and said, “While it is important to implement minimum energy perfor-mance standards for build-ings to reduce energy con-sumption, we should now start looking at the broader NZEB goal.”

17 URBAN NEWS DIGEST | JUly 2016 digital cities

Gartner said in a report that the smart cities planned by the gov-ernment would use nearly 1.6 billion of connected things or Internet of Things (IoT) in 2016, an increase of 39% from 2015.

“Smart commercial build-ings will be the highest user of IoT until 2017, after which smart homes will take the lead with just over one billion connected things in 2018,” said Gartner’s Research Vice President Bet-tina Tratz-Ryan.

IoT implementation greatly benefits commercial real estate as it creates a unified view of facilities management as well as advanced service operations

through the collection of data and insights from a multitude of sensors.

“In 2016, commercial secu-rity cameras and webcams as well as indoor LEDs will drive total growth, representing 24% of the IoT market for smart cit-ies,” she said.

Tratz-Ryan further stated that IoT deployment in com-mercial buildings would con-tinue to grow at a rapid pace over the next few years and is on pace to reach just over one billion in 2018.

In smart homes, the con-sumer IoT applications that are fuelling growth are smart

TVs, smart set-top boxes, smart bulbs and various home auto-mation tools such as smart ther-mostats, home security systems and kitchen appliances.

“The growing maturity of smart home platforms through an ecosystem of home appli-ances, infotainment and home sensors will mean that smart home investments overtake those of commercial buildings in 2018,” Tratz-Ryan added.

Gartner further noted that smart homes would represent 21% of total IoT use in smart cit-ies in 2016, and would record the highest increase over the next five years.

Gartner predicts an increase of IoT usage in 2016

The Digital Mission for the state of Arunachal Pradesh got a major push after a detailed roadmap was agreed by the Centre during a delib-eration in New Delhi.

A high-level team was led by state chief secretary Shakuntala D Gamlin, with Department of Electronics and Information Technol-ogy (DeitY) Secretary Aruna Sharma, NIC Director Gen-eral Nita Verma and others.

The purpose of the high-level strategy meeting was to address various issues and bottlenecks with regard to IT, e-Governance and Telecom in the state.

The chief secretary briefed about the status of various core infrastructure projects as well as National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN), State Wide Area Network (SWAN), Supervisory Development Centre (SDC), Universal Ser-vice Obligation Fund (USOF) and National Knowledge

Network (NKN).Gamlin recommended

DeitY to strengthen the infrastructure comprehen-sively and called for a differ-ent approach for the state.

For the IT initiatives, a fast-tracking strategy was agreed upon for a turnkey solution by the Centre through NIC for both the State Wide Area Network and State Data Cen-tre in the state.

The chief secretary called for an immediate roll-out of existing citizen-centric and governance related e-Solu-tion of NIC following cus-tomisation for the state’s requirements which the Cen-tre agreed to implement in a time-bound manner.

The Delhi Cabinet discussed an ambitious app-based pre-mium bus scheme after Lt Governor Najeeb Jung asked it to be reviewed again.

The government would apprise Jung in a written com-munication as to why the city needs the app-based premium bus service which would help strengthen the public trans-port in the national capital.

The meeting chaired by Chief Minister Arvind

Kejriwal also discussed the sections of Motor Vehicles ACT under which the scheme was to be introduced, add-ing that the government may also seek people’s opinion to implement it.

Under the scheme announced by Transport Minister Gopal Rai, people can book their seats in a bus through their smart phone on the lines of app-based taxi services.

Smart homes market may grow 30% year-on-year, says report

A recent survey has revealed that with the growing influence of technology and digitisation, the concept of smart homes is gaining popularity and is likely to grow at 30% year-on-year, potentially ensuring that the market would double in reve-nue every three years.

As per a study conducted by Schneider Electric India, high awareness among consumers

about smart homes is set to drive the growth for smart home solutions in future and is expected to witness a growth of 30% year-on-year.

The survey was conducted among end customers of pre-mium apartment complexes, duplex, triplex and villas within the range of `50 lakh to `1 crore, `1-5 crore and over `5 crore as well as builders of

such complexes. According to the survey,

security, convenience and energy efficiency were the larg-est drivers for smart homes fol-lowed by comfort and prestige.

“Almost 75% respondents were aware of smart homes which was almost univer-sal among the upper-end seg-ment. But awareness was low among the lower end, since these respondents hailed from smaller towns, with 11% not aware even on being prompted,” said Schneider Electric India Vice President, Buildings and Partner Shrinivas Chebbi.

As per the survey, in the `5 crore and above segment, 100% respondents were aware of smart homes, while in the `1-5 crore bracket, 87% were aware. In the `50 lakh to `1 crore sec-tion, only 49% were aware, while another 28% expressed awareness on being prompted, with the balance 23% having no awareness at all.

1.5 million Indians using Wi-Fi across 19 railway stations, reveals Google

Google has revealed that nearly 1.5 million Indians are using the high-speed Wi-Fi services at 19 railways stations across the country which the company provided as part of its project.

The company recently rolled out the network at four of India’s largest stations namely Sealdah, Lucknow Junction, Lucknow City and Gorakhpur Junction.

The company informed that while they are only at approximately 20% of the roll-out schedule for this year, the response has been unparalleled.

“We saw 100,000 users con-nect to the network within a week of launch at Mumbai Cen-tral and as we started rolling out the network at more stations, we

saw an exponential jump in the consumption of the network,” Google said in a blog post.

As per the data provided, Bhubaneshwar has overtaken Mumbai Central in terms of data usage within a day of the launch and Google is seeing similar usage patterns in other tier 2 cities like Patna, Jaipur and Vishakhapatnam.

Digital Mission in Arunachal gets a major boost

Delhi Cabinet discusses app-based premium bus scheme

urban news digest | July 2016 • 18vibrant CitieS

The state tourism department in Uttarakhand would now get writ-ers to pen untold stories shared by local people relating to dak bun-galows in the forests. These sto-ries would then be published and publicised in order to promote eco-tourism in villages situated close to the forest areas.

Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forests, STS Lecha said, “The government order to form an eco-tourism Develop-ment Corporation has already been issued. Chief Minister in a meeting held with the forest offi-cial instructed to activate this cor-poration, whereby the homestays scheme would be made more effective to strengthen the con-cept of eco-tourism as well as her-itage tourism in the forest belt of the state.”

A committee made up of three vice-presidents and two public representatives would be formed to prepare action plan in this regard. A single window system would be introduced to grant per-mission for trekking and hiking. The beach camp policy would soon be finalised.

“The corporation would start eco-tourism activities such as

such as bird watching, nature guide, rock climbing etc in the vil-lages situated close to the forest, which occupy 60 area of the state. This would thus strengthen their economy and increase avenues of livelihood for them. The local arti-sans who would be provided wood free of cost so that they can prepare wood artefacts to highlight local culture of the place,” he said.

Uttarakhand to promote eco-tourism through dak bungalow

Indian government to permit short yoga trips under e-tourist visa

Foreign citizens looking for a short yoga retreat in India would now be able to avail the quick e-Tourist Visa.

As per a statement from the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Government has decided to include “attending a short-term yoga programme” and “short duration medical treat-ment under Indian systems of

medicine” in the list of permis-sible activities under e-Tourist Visa.

Presently, a tourist visa is granted to a foreigner whose sole objective of visiting India is for recreation, sightseeing and casual visit to meet friends or relatives, short duration medical treatment or casual business visit.

Bangladesh adopts SMART patrolling to protect the SundarbansIn response to the threats of wildlife, forestry crime and ille-gal fishing in the Sundarbans, the Government of Bangladesh through its Forest Department is expanding the scope of its current protection efforts.

Central to this effort would be the adoption of SMART (Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool) patrol manage-ment, which uses information collected from boat and foot patrols, intelligence sources, tour operators and fishing communities to inform manag-ers about the distribution and intensity of threats to wildlife, fisheries and forests.

16 officers from the Forest

Department have been “trained to train” 30 staff who would be charged with leading the front-line efforts to patrol the Sun-darbans and suppress illegal activity.

SMART is a user-friendly combination of software, train-ing materials, and implemen-tation standards, which has been designed for use in front-line enforcement. It meets the needs of managers by pro-viding access to information and easy to understand maps about the conservation area and the locations of threats. Patrolling data from SMART would strengthen the ability of conservation programmes

to combat wildlife poaching and other illegal activities. SMART empowers managers to plan a strategic response to forest crime and protected area enforcement.

The World Bank is pro-viding support for the imple-mentation of patrolling efforts under the Strengthen-ing Regional Cooperation for Wildlife Protection (SRCWP) Project.

“The training is an exten-sion of our efforts to protect the Sundarbans by using informa-tion management approaches,” said Zahir Ahmed, Conser-vator of Forests, Khulna Divi-sion. “The SMART patrolling

approach will help us to better combat poaching, illegal fish-ing, vessel and pollution infrac-tions, and other forest crimes. It will strengthen the capacity of our frontline staff, and at the same time build training capac-ity for forest protection within our ranks.”

The training of trainers and frontline staff training exer-cises are being organised in the framework of the German gov-ernment commissioned joint German - Bangladesh “Sun-darbans Management Project” (SMP). SMP is implemented by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenar-beit (GIZ).

SMP’s Principle Advi-sor, Oemar Idoe, emphasised, “Capacity development for the effective management of the Sundarbans is one of the central aspects of our project. The close collaboration of all stakeholders and information exchange is crucial for ensur-ing long-term protection of this unique ecosystem.”

India and Bangladesh are close to finalising a luxury cruise ser-vice from Kolkata to Dhaka for tourists.

“Currently, the two coun-tries have a protocol for just the movement of cargo ships across the border. But plans are afoot to sign a new protocol which would allow cruise ships carry-ing tourists across the border,” said Arvind Kumar, Assistant Director of Inland Waterways Authority of India under the ministry of shipping.

The talks are at an advanced stage and if things proceed as planned, the service could become a reality by the end of this year covering 900-km odd route in 14-day long trip.

The Indian part would be monitored by the Inland Water-ways Authority of India, while Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Corporation would monitor it in Bangladesh.

“Vivada Cruises sent propos-als to both the state government

and the Union government,” said SR Banerjee, a consultant with the company that operates luxury cruise packages on the River Hooghly.

As per the plan, tourists would first be taken upstream up to Shantipur in Nadia to see the weaver’s community. On the way, they would visit places including Dakshineswar Tem-ple, Chandannagar, Bandel among others.

The cruise would then sail downstream and reach the Indian Sundarbans. It will then cross the border at Hemnagar and sail up to Mongla where they can visit the Bangladesh part of the Sunderbans.

Tourists would get a glimpse of the backwaters of Atgor Khuriyana, the ancient city of Sonargaon and Chandpur which known for its top quality Hilsa fish.

india, bangladesh soon to allow river cruise from kolkata to dhaka

Leela Group signs a pact to build hotel near the Taj Mahal

An agreement has been signed between the Leela Group and Qatar’s Al Faisal Group to build a five-star hotel near Taj Mahal in Agra with an FDI of about ̀ 500 crore.

The 250-room hotel, which is to be built in 30 months, would entail an FDI of about `500 crore, said Leela Group Chairman Vivek Nair after signing the pact with Chair-man of Al Faisal Group Sheikh Faisal bin Qassim Al Thani. The agreement was signed fol-lowing Prime Minister Naren-dra Modi’s interaction with top business leaders of Qatar in

which Sheikh Faisal was also present.

The hotel would be built under the brand name of ‘Aiana’ and would be the sixth such hotel in India, said Amruda Nair, Joint Man-aging Director and CEO of Aiana Hotels and Resorts. The hotel would be built on an area of seven acres, just one km from Taj Mahal, Amruda said. “We will be developing a two-hotel complex with a total of 250 rooms. There will 100-room Leela Palace and 150 room-Aiana on top of a shared podium,” she said.

19 URBAN NEWS DIGEST | JUly 2016 VIBrAnt CItIES

Begunkodar railway station in Purulia district of West Bengal remained abandoned for more than 40 years, due to fears of being haunted.

As the railway minister, Mamata Banerjee dismissed all reports of the ghost and reopened the station in 2009. A few trains stopped but only dur-ing the day, but locals shied away from going near the station.

Now, a Kolkata-based para-normal research body is plan-ning to put Begunkodar on the ghost tourism map.

The Systematic Paranor-mal Investigation and Research Team has joined with tour oper-ator Purulia Tourism to take visitors on a tour of the ghost-infested railway station. The package includes travel, hotel

accommodation and a mid-night visit to the station which includes a storytelling session on the history of Begunkodar.

“People want to experience the paranormal. We will try and give it to them. The station was closed for years after ghosts were spotted by the locals. So many stories are linked to it. Even now, locals don’t venture

near the station after sundown,” said Soumen Roy, who is a co-founder and a leading face of the paranormal research body.

“We invite everyone to expe-rience the world of the para-normal. We will create the right atmosphere at the rail sta-tion. So far we have got a good response and the first trip will be announced soon,” Roy added.

West Bengal to have its first ghost tourism destination

Maharaja Express set to travel through Goa & kerala next monsoonsLuxury train Maharaja Express is set to have a new route next monsoons which would take it through South India, informed Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu.

“There is ample scope for tourism in Goa and (the) Konkan belt. I have asked (the) Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation Limited (IRCTC) to introduce world’s most expensive luxury train Maharaja Express in southern India covering Goa, Maharashtra and Kerala,” he said.

The minister said plans are to make sure that by next year, Maharaja Express should make trips in Goa during the monsoon season. According to Prabhu, this would help to attract rich tourists to Goa.

“The travel by this train is very expensive and hence will

attract high-end tourist and gen-erate revenue for railway as well as (the) state,” he said, adding that the train would help gener-ate employment.

The Minister further said the Konkan Railway Corporation would have 10 more railway sta-tions along the Goa, Konkan, Kar-nataka and Kerala route for which `150 crore would be allocated.

“Konkan Railway is not only important for the belt, but today it serves as an important lifeline for the people of Goa, Konkan, and Kerala,” Prabhu added.

First meeting of national committee on ramayana circuit & krishna circuit under swadesh darshan scheme heldThe ‘1st meeting of National Committee on Ramayana Circuit and National Com-mittee on Krishna Circuit’ under Swadesh Darshan Scheme of Ministry of Tour-ism held under the chairman-ship of the Minister of Tour-ism and Culture Dr Mahesh Sharma. Secretary, Minis-try of Tourism Vinod Zut-shi, experts and senior offi-cers of Ministry of Tourism were present. Presentations were made on Pan-India

Ramayana & Krishna Circuit on the occasion.

Under Ramayana Cir-cuit, 11 destinations spread across six states have been proposed. The destinations covered are Ayodhya, Nan-digram, Shringhverpur & Chitrakoot (Uttar Pradesh); Sitamarhi, Buxar & Darb-hanga (Bihar); Jagdalpur (Chattisgarh); Bhadracha-lam (Telangana); Hampi (Karnataka); and Ramesh-waram (Tamil Nadu). Expert

committee suggested includ-ing Chitrakoot (Madhya Pradesh), Nashik & Nagpur (Maharashtra) and Mahen-dragiri (Odisha) in the pro-posed circuit.

Under Krishna circuit, 12 destinations spread across five states have been pro-posed. The destinations cov-ered are Dwarka (Gujarat); Nathdwara, Jaipur & Sikar (Rajasthan); Kurukshetra (Haryana), Mathura, Vrinda-van, Gokul, Barsana, Nandgaon

& Govardhan (Uttar Pradesh); Puri (Odisha). The destinations were approved by the expert committee.

Further, projects worth more than `300 crore were approved in-principle in Uttar Pradesh under both the circuits.

Rashtrapati Bhavan to open three new tourist circuitsSecretary to the President, Omita Paul held a meeting recently with 24 prominent tour operators at Rashtrapati Bhavan in order to publicise three tourist circuits that are being developed within Rashtrapati Bhavan. The three new tourist circuits will be the Rashtrapati Bhavan main building, museums and the gar-dens which the visitors can see singly or in combination.

These circuits will be inau-gurated on July 25, 2016. Addressing the tour operators,

Omita Paul, Secretary to the President said the Rashtrapati Bhavan is looking forward to serving as a major tourist des-tination. She asked them to create greater awareness and attract visitors from both India and abroad.

The Secretary to the Pres-ident informed the tour oper-ators that since the beginning of the 13th Presidency in July 2012, the efforts of the President Pranab Mukherjee have been to demystify every aspect of

Rashtrapati Bhavan and bring it closer to the general public. It was important as many peo-ple as possible have the oppor-tunity to view this great monu-ment of living heritage. Visitors to Rashtrapati Bhavan now have the convenience of book-ing and paying for their visits online. In addition to the Rash-trapati Bhavan building, now two museum complexes and beautifully manicured gardens of Rashtrapati Bhavan will be added to the tourist circuits.

Ministry of Tourism celebrated the 2nd International Day of Yoga by hosting a FAM Tour for a group of 50 foreign dele-gates consisting of Tour Oper-ators/ Travel Agents/ Media Persons/ Opinion Makers/ Scholars from 20 countries which are source markets and the markets that matter for pro-motion of Yoga and Wellness.

This group of 50 delegates split into 2 groups who then participated in Delhi and Chan-digarh separately on the Inter-national Day of Yoga.

Both the groups then fol-lowed a tour program includ-ing visit to the wellness & spiritual centres in Harid-war, Rishikesh, Trivandrum,

Cochin, Neyyar (Kerala), Pondicherry & Chennai.

This year the Ministry of Tourism also undertook the following activities for public-ity and promotion of Yoga:

• Creativeofposters,stand-ees, etc. to promote Interna-tional Day of Yoga were sent to India Tourism Offices – Domestic and Overseas for production.

• TheMinistryofTourismre-printed ‘India – The Land of Yoga’ brochure, the soft copy of which was sent to the India Tourism Offices overseas for production/ distribution.

The Ministry also promoted International Day of Yoga through Social Media.

ministry of tourism promotes international yoga day

urban news digest | July 2016 • 20integrated CitieS

As per a top company exec-utive, Mahindra World City Developers Ltd, that has built two integrated business cities in Chennai and Jaipur of 1,500 acres and 3,000 acres, respec-tively, would build its next cit-ies in smaller formats of 300 acres each.

Sangeeta Prasad, Chief Executive Officer of Mahindra World City said that the com-pany’s immediate priority is to build smaller industrial parks which the company internally calls ‘World City Lite.’ It would also expand the industrial land area within its Jaipur township.

According to the new

business plan, the company is also reworking the master plan of its seven-year-old Jai-pur township to expand the space allocated to domestic tar-iff areas (DTAs) to 1,000 acres from the earlier planned 500 acres while reducing the resi-dential area. The strategy is in line with the company’s plan to cater to growing demands from firms which are looking to set up facilities in India.

The company has already chalked out plans to set up industrial parks in Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh, which would have a more dedicated indus-trial area, and less of residential

and social zones in it.“We had signed a Memoran-

dum of Understanding (MoU) with the Andhra Pradesh gov-ernment last year and we are exploring the possibility of setting up an industrial park there. We also got in-principal approval to start an industrial park in Gujarat a few years ago and we are actively looking in Maharashtra as well,” Prasad said.

She said while land aggre-gation for the industrial park has already started in Gujarat, it is currently scouting for an appropriate location in Andhra Pradesh.

Mahindra World City to build its future cities in smaller formats

The Haryana government has announced that it would develop a new industrial township, spread over 1,500 acres in Sohna and Manesar areas of Gurgaon, at a cost of $5 billion.

A MoU regarding this has been signed between the Haryana government and China Fortune Land Develop-ment (CFLD) company in the presence of Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar in New Delhi.

“The agreement was signed by Managing Director, Hary-ana Industrial and Infrastruc-ture Development Corpora-tion (HSIIDC), Sudhir Rajpal, and President, China Fortune Land Development Company, Jerry Zhao,” said a spokesman for the state government.

Khattar stated that under the agreement, HSIIDC and CFLD Company would exe-cute the project as a joint ven-ture (JV).

“The Chinese firm would

develop infrastructural facil-ities, industrial units and residential and commer-cial projects in the township. Industrial units related to automobiles and electronics would be established in this township,” he said

“These projects would be completed within the next 10 years and would generate employment opportunities for

lakhs of youth, besides mak-ing available state-of-the-art health and education facili-ties,” Khattar added.

Zhao said that the company has identified the required land in Sohna and Manesar area, and hoped that all for-malities would be completed soon, with the work on the projects to begin by the end of the year.

Adlabs Entertainment has informed that its wholly-owned subsidiary, Walk-water Properties Pvt Ltd (WPPL), has received loca-tional clearance from the Maharashtra government for developing a special township.

The subsidiary received the clearance on part of the surplus land owned by WPPL adjacent to the Imag-ica theme park located at

Khalapur in Raigad district of Maharashtra.

The clearance is for 88 acres of land out of the total surplus land of approxi-mately 138 acres held by WPPL. The company is in the process of obtaining approval for the balance sur-plus land as well. The loca-tional clearance marks a sig-nificant milestone towards monetisation of the surplus land owned by WPPL.

Amaravati expected to be developed on par with the capital of Kazakhstan

The capital of Andhra Pradesh (AP), Amaravati is expected to be developed on par with Astana city, the capital of Kazakhstan. Astana mayor Asset Issekeshev assured coop-eration for development of the capital, with the AP government and Astana city mayor deciding to form a working group with five members each from two cit-ies for better cooperation. They have also decided to enter into a

MoU soon.A delegation led by Chief

Minister N Chandrababu Naidu toured Astana city. They viewed the city from the 97 metre Betherek tower constructed in memory of declaring Astana as capital in 1997.

Naidu, later in an interac-tive session with Astana mayor, sought the cooperation for development of Amaravati and invited him to visit AP.

Assuring necessary coop-eration, Issekeshev praised the initiative of Chandrababu Naidu in IT development and prom-ised to introduce a direct flight service from Astana to Ama-ravati after discussing with the defence minister.

Stating that ̀ we have to learn many things from Astana city’ the Chief Minister said that a roadmap should be developed for cooperation between the cit-ies. He said that the cooperation should not be confined to capi-tal development and it should be extended to other sectors.

Responding to the CM’s invi-tation, Astana mayor said that he would soon announce the names of the working group. Promising cooperation in the development of Amaravati, the mayor further said that they are looking for development of tourism and industrial sector in their country.

Bike taxis to be introduce in New Town The satellite township of Kolkata, New Town is getting ready for app based bike taxis.

A notification regarding the introduction of these vehicles has brought out by the West Bengal State Traffic Depart-ment, with licenses to be issued by the Regional Trans-port Authority (RTA) of North 24 Parganas district.

The bike taxis would be GPS-enabled to communicate with the app and more than one pillion rider would not be allowed on the vehicles.

In addition, the driver would have to provide a hel-met to the pillion rider before

starting the vehicle. Pillion riders would not be allowed to carry any luggage on the bike taxis, apart from for minimal baggage or a briefcase.

Although they would cover the whole of New Town, these bikes would not be allowed to ply on Major Arterial Road, except the crossing.

To get the project running, West Bengal Housing Infra-structure Development Cor-poration (WBHIDCO) has contacted cab service com-pany Ola and another firm in the same domain, which cur-rently operates bike taxis in Gurgaon.

haryana to develop new industrial township in gurgaon

Adlabs gets clearance nod for township development

urban news digest | July 2016 • 21 CaPex

Architecture studio Wimberly, Allison, Tong & Goo (WATG) has designed what it says would be the world’s first freeform 3D-printed house. Its design of arch-based ‘Curve Appeal’ would be made a reality after it won Branch Technology’s Free-form Home Design Challenge.

“Curve Appeal is a very thoughtful approach to the design of our first house,” explains Branch Technology founder Platt Boyd. “It responds well to the site conditions, mag-nifies the possibilities of cellular fabrication and pushes the enve-lope of what is possible while still utilising more economical methods for conventional build-ing systems integration.”

Curve Appeal’s cave-like form is based on quadrilater-ally aligned archways, while taking into account the inter-nal layout requirements and the site boundaries. It includes an interior core which acts as an

abutment (or a support struc-ture) and an exterior skin. It is hoped that the resulting curved form would blend with the site like an organic presence.

To build the structure, 28 panels would be 3D-printed off-site, before being slotted together on-site to create two exterior walls, the roof and the interior core. These four main sections would then be hoisted into place and joined together.

Once completed, the Curve Appeal home would have open and light-filled interior liv-ing spaces. Passive strategies would be employed for keeping

the building temperate, such as carefully located windows which can create a thru-draft and features that can help foster warmth in the winter and keep the building cool in the sum-mer. It is hoped that the large expanses of glass would help to connect the occupants to the outside and to nature.

WATG, as a result of win-ning the competition, has been awarded $8,000 and would have its Curve Appeal design con-structed. It would be located in Chattanooga, Tennessee, U.S., with 3D printing expected to begin next year.

Curve Appeal to become world’s first 3D-printed freeform house

dubai unveils world’s first 3d-printed office building In the near-future, 3D print-ing technology promises to revolutionise architecture by allowing designers to literally click-and-print complex build-ings at a lower cost and faster speed than traditional con-struction methods.

Dubai took a step towards that future by completing the world’s first 3D-printed office, dubbed as the Office of the Future. The building, taking up a footprint of 250 sq m, is located within Dubai’s Emir-ates Towers complex and would serve as a fully-func-tional office.

A very large 3D printer,

measuring 20 x 120 x 40 ft, did the majority of the work, print-ing the building by extrud-ing a cement mixture layer by layer. There were also some additional smaller mobile 3D-printers used too.

The basic building took 17 days to print, but it then required finishing both inter-nally and externally. The building was printed in sec-tions elsewhere before being assembled over two days on-site.

The project is part of a wider push to make Dubai and the United Arab Emirates a world leader in 3D-printing.

Parisian housing block proposed for a neighbourhood in Paris MAD, a Beijing studio, has unveiled plans for a Parisian housing block surrounded by undulating balconies that is set to become the firm’s first residen-tial project in Europe. Known as UNIC, the 50-metre-tall block would feature floor plates with undulating edges and glazed walls to give residents views of the Paris skyline.

MAD won an international design competition for the scheme, which it worked on in cooperation with local practice Accueil-Biecher Architectes. The tower would be located in the developing Clichy-Batignol-les neighbourhood of Paris, next to the Martin Luther King Park and Renzo Piano’s yet-to-be-completed courthouse.

The tower’s asymmet-ric floors decrease in scale on the way to its summit, offering a range of secluded and pub-lic balconies thus creating a

stepped outline.The terraces would be

planted with trees in an effort to extend the adjacent park verti-cally and balconies on the upper-most floors of the 13-story build-ing would boast views of the Eiffel Tower.

“The floating and upward-growing form responds to an organic scheme,” said MAD. “Representing stacked

courtyards, the distance between human and nature is collapsed.”

The building’s curvilinear podium would be joined to a neighbouring public housing scheme, which would provide access to a new stretch of the Paris Metro, as well as a kinder-garten, shops, and restaurants.

The UNIC scheme is expected to be completed in 2018.

CEBRA, in partnership with landscape architect SLA, has designed the Sustainable School for The Sustainable City in Dubai. In opposition to hot-climate educational environ-ments which are regularly large, air-conditioned structures, CEBRA’s vision for The Sustain-able City proposes permeability between outdoor and indoor learning environments, employ-ing both in equal measure.

“We had to rethink the school in our design. Why not take advantage of the warm climate,

move many of the functions of the school away from artificial air-conditioned rooms, and out in a naturally ventilated, cooled environment?”says Mikkel

Hallundbæk Schlesinger, Archi-tect and Head of CEBRA’s Abu Dhabi office.

The Sustainable City’s green-ery continues into the school and up the building’s facade, and students would actively contribute to this dialogue by maintaining gardens for veg-etables and flowers. The City project is being developed by Diamond Developers which consists of townhouses and courtyard villas inspired by Dubai’s historic ‘Bastakyia’ dis-trict, as well as a hotel and inno-vation centre. The City’s energy would come from solar cells and all wastewater would be treated and reused.

CEBRA & SLA design a school for The Sustainable City in Dubai

Autodesk streamlines 3D printing of large, complex objectsAt Autodesk, a team of engi-neers has been pushing the limitations of conventional 3D printing by creating a net-work to harness their collec-tive power. Autodesk’s ‘Proj-ect Escher’ is a new printing system which utilises the

power of several 3D printers at once to fabricate complex parts in unison. The new sys-tem can increase production speed by up to 90%.

Although the benefits of 3D printing are undeniable, its lengthy process has ham-pered it from being rolled out in large-scale additive manufacturing. Designers in industries such as auto-motive, aerospace and con-struction want to utilise the power of 3D printing to form complex geometries, but as the printing is measured in weight per hour, large objects

can take impossibly long amounts of time.

Project Escher uses a gan-try system with suspended 3D printing ‘bots,’ selec-tively assigning a part of the model to each, producing a fully assembled final object.

Autodesk’s hardware lead for the project, Corey Bloome, said that there are no limits to a number of printing bots you can have in the gantry and the speed would increase with each bot added.

Currently, as the design stands, this system uses only 3D printers but Bloome said that in theory robotic arms could be added to the gantry, allowing other elements to be embedded in the final assem-bly. This means that complex objects, such as cars, have the possibility of being ‘printed’ in one sitting.

22 URBAN NEWS DIGEST | JUly 2016CAPEx

An innovative entrepreneur in Gujarat’s Ahmedabad has opened first of its kind ‘porta-ble hotel’ known as Beetle smart hotels, made out of shipping containers.

Tanmay Bathwal, who runs the Ahmedabad-based Hirise Hospitality Pvt Ltd, believes that portable hotels is a great solution to cater to the high demand for hassle-free movable rooms ideal for remote locations, industry clusters and venues holding

big-ticket cultural conventions.“We are calling it a portable

hotel, we have used discarded containers in an innovative man-ner, we have made hotel rooms out of it and the entire hotel becomes portable. We don’t require much construction, we only require base supports to place our containers,” Bathwal said.

“As far as the marketing is concerned there is an endless market, because where ever a

new industrial cluster is coming up, or where ever there is a tour-ism destination, where construc-tion is a problem or is restricted because of environmental rea-sons there we go in,” he added.

The rooms consist of plush interiors and decor along with top security mechanisms and safe deposit lockers. Hirise Hospitality Pvt Ltd is plan-ning to add 2,000 portable hotel rooms across the country in a span of a year.

Ahmedabad firm opens a Portable hotel made out of containers

The design for Coral Holiday Apartments, an upscale life-style community in Seychelles, has been unveiled by Archi-tects of Invention. The project, located on the reclaimed por-tion of the main island of Sey-chelles, would feature profes-sionally serviced apartments, a spa, several restaurants, a club-house, a pool, private marina and direct access to the beach.

To replicate sustainability solutions from nature, the proj-ect utilises bio mimicry and is based on the models, systems

and growth of coral. The archi-tect states that “the structures of the project derive from the content of units in continuous movement resembling a sea creature, coral or the moving of the sea.”

To optimise ocean views from apartment windows, the apartment complex would be “arranged as single or sev-eral interlocked architectural spaces along the entire length of the parcel.” Therefore, half of the apartments in the build-ing would have ocean views.

Taiwanese transport hub to have a flowing green canopyIn the Taiwanese city of Kaoh-siung, a new train station is set to become the centrepiece of a larger transport hub which would boast a huge cover of new public space and knit together the local area. Kaoh-siung Station would cover an area of 8.5 ha and boast a 35,000 sq m green canopy.

The station designed by Netherlands-based architec-ture studio Mecanoo describes it as a key project in the trans-formation of Kaohsiung. It is said to be “the crowning achievement of the massive Kaohsiung Metropolitan Area Underground Railway Proj-ect,” which would see the con-struction of an underground section between Zuoying & Fengshan and seven under-ground stations along the

9.75-km stretch of tunnel.To accommodate the devel-

opment, the existing colo-nial Japanese station building would be relocated back to its original site, which, accord-ing to Mecanoo, would sub-sequently be embraced by the newly-constructed canopy.

The canopy itself would intro-duce a huge cover of green public space aimed at activat-ing the local community and providing an exciting first impression to visitors.

Kaohsiung Station is expected to be completed in 2024.

Coral Holiday Apartments in Seychelles utilises bio mimicry to resemble coral

Sideways elevators could ease commutes in LondonIn London, a recent debate panel made up of government and industry representa-tives discussed the problems which the city’s Under-ground system faced from growing passenger demand and how elevators that move sideways as well as up and down could take some of the pressure off.

The London Underground is the world’s oldest subter-ranean urban passenger train system.

Transport for London (TfL) has made efforts to modernise the system and make it more pleasant to use with stations that have more amenities, but the Under-ground suffers from a fun-damental problem. As new lines have been added over the years, the stations that act as the interface between them have become a maze of pedestrian tunnels, escala-tors, and platforms, which is often confusing even for an experienced traveller.

One solution to this that the panel considered was Thyssenkrupp’s MULTI ele-vator system, which replaces cables with a magnetic-based drive that runs along shafts equipped with rotating junc-tions that allow the cars to move sideways as well as up and down. As per Thyssenk-rupp, this allows the cars to carry 50% more passengers and since the cars can go in a circle, it’s possible to have one available at any floor

within 15 to 30 seconds.According to Chris Wil-

liamson, co-founder and partner at architecture firm Weston Williamson & Part-ners, this arrangement would not only be easier on commuters, it would also simplify station design and allow for new lines to be built under the already crowded subterranean landscape of the capital without having to radically modify existing stations.

Penda has unveiled plans for a series of stacked villas which would bring gardens high into the skies of Hyderabad, India. The complex is the second stage of the Magic Breeze project for Pooja Crafted Homes, with the first stage featuring a landscape design inspired by Indian step-wells and water mazes.

The 450,000 square foot proj-ect would consist of 127 duplex sky villas, ranging in size from 2,600 to 4,000 square feet, each separated by a double-height pri-vate garden terrace. The struc-ture would be incorporated into the landscape design, turn-ing the park on its side to con-tinue vertically up the side of the building.

Penda, in designing the sky villa complex, looked to the architectural typology of “pri-vate house with a garden,” sur-rounding each 2-story unit with a 500 square foot balcony con-taining a ribbon of lawn and a modular planter system. By giv-ing each villa a spacious green space, the complex retains a

sense of lightness and openness, even when the units are stacked.

The gardens would also work as an effective passive cooling system for the build-ing, providing natural venti-lation all through the complex and shielding residents from the hot climate Hyderabad. This, in turn, would save up to 60% of the energy consumed by a typical condominium building, reduc-ing the project’s overall carbon footprint.

penda unveils plans for villas with vertical gardens in hyderabad

urban news digest | July 2016 • 23haPPening CitieS

About 110 mayors and city leaders representing 103 cities from 63 countries and regions from around the world gathered at the World Cities Summit 2016 to dis-cuss changes, challenges and innovations emerging in their cities. These cities included Seoul, Antwerp, Ham-burg and Rotterdam. Their interactions at the Summit - a premier platform to develop real-world solutions that address urban sustainability challenges - highlighted the global need to focus on social, technology and gov-ernance innovations to build resilient, liveable and sus-tainable cities of the future.

Held from July 10 - 14, the 5th edition of the World Cities Summit (WCS), together with Singapore Interna-tional Water Week (SIWW) and CleanEnviro Summit Singapore (CESS), was attended by more than 21,000 visitors and participants including ministers, mayors, government officials, industry leaders and experts, aca-demics, as well as representatives from international organisations. This year, besides established tracks on

urban governance and long-term planning and devel-opment, WCS also provided a platform for discussions on the softer aspects of a sustainable and liveable city - community and culture - in particular how heritage and culture can be integrated into the urban planning and design of cities.

WCS 2016 also featured a full-day track on innova-tions for a smart city. As part of this expanded focus on innovation, the inaugural City Solutions Singapore was launched as a seamless global marketplace to drive end-to-end sustainable development and showcase solu-tions, as well as to provide a platform for new partner-ships and business opportunities. The expo had over 1,000 participating companies, from industry leaders

to innovative start-ups in urban development, water, waste and cleaning management.

A key highlight of the expo was the “Towards a Smart and Sustainable Singapore” pavilion, showcasing collaborative efforts of more than 16 local government agencies. One of the showcases was the CityScope - a

real-time interactive urban planning tool that uses aug-mented reality and Lego-like bricks to simulate urban environments for test-bedding purposes.

Besides adopting innovation in technology to build greater resilience, cities are also looking to innovate the way in which they engage their people and involve them in co-creating solutions for a better living environment.

The Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize 2016 Laureate, Medellín, Colombia, shared at the Prize Lecture on how leveraging on co-creation and the collective inputs of its citizens have helped tackled its most pressing issues, improved the economy, as well as its citizens’ employ-ability and quality of life. The four cities accorded Spe-cial Mentions - Auckland, Sydney, Toronto and Vienna - further demonstrated how open community engage-ment and social integration have contributed to their successful urban transformations.

Citizen engagement is therefore essential for cre-ating not only liveable and sustainable cities, but also resilient ones. Beyond infrastructure, the softer aspects of a city also impact on the people’s quality of life. Culture is one key aspect. For the first time in 2016, there was a dedicated WCS track exploring how heri-tage and culture can be integrated into the urban plan-ning and the design of cities.

The key theme of innovation was further rein-forced by the collaborations announced during WCS 2016, such as the Singapore Government’s plans to partner Microsoft to explore next-generation govern-ment services using chatbots for selected public ser-vices. ENGIE also launched its Singapore Lab to act as a regional hub for energy innovation and technology

in Southeast Asia, while Surbana Jurong unveiled the world’s first integrated smart city solutions offering.

“We are seeing greater genesis of synergies and col-laborative efforts between private companies, inter-national organisations and government agencies at WCS,” said Mr Larry Ng, Managing Director of the

World Cities Summit. “The combination of technol-ogy, social and governance innovation will form the foundation of the resilient, liveable and sustainable cit-ies needed to address the challenge of rapid urbanisa-tion in Asia and beyond.”

The next World Cities Summit will be held from July 8 – 12, 2018 at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre, Singapore. The World Cities Summit Mayors Forum 2017 will be held in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, China.

World Cities Summit 2016 aligns focus on urban and social innovations, and public-private partnerships to build resilient cities