As part of the nationwide Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav (AKAM) celebrations, the Smart Cities Mission (SCM), Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA), National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA) and 15 leading Indian academic institutions has launched a ‘Smart cities and Academia Towards Action & Research (SAAR)’ programme.
What will be done under SAAR?
i.Firstly, there will be preparation of a compendium of 75 landmark urban projects under SCM. These will be innovative, multi-sectoral, and have been implemented across geographies. The compendium will act as a first point of reference for future research, help disseminate learnings and best practices from projects, and act as a repository for Urban Projects.
- These 75 projects in the compendium cover 47 Smart Cities.
- The compendium will be launched in June 2022.
ii.The 15 participating academic institutes will work with Smart Cities to document landmark projects undertaken by the SCM. The linkage between the Institutions and Smart Cities will be facilitated by MoHUA and NIUA.
- The documents will capture the learnings from best practices, provide opportunities for engagement on urban development projects to students, and enable real-time information flow between urban practitioners and academia.
- The Institutes will also document the outcomes of these projects, on how they are impacting the lives of urban citizens.
- Team of students, mentors from these premier institutions will visit these 47 smart cities to document these projects in the month of January/February, 2022.
- The 15 Institutes are Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee; Malaviya National Institute of Technology; Jamia Millia Islamia, Delhi; R V College of Architecture, Bangalore; Anna University; College of Engineering, Trivandrum; Department of Architecture & Planning, Manipal University; Center for Environment Planning and Technology, Ahmedabad; College of Engineering, Pune ;Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture, Mumbai; Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur; Indian Institute of Science and Environment Technology, Shibpur; School of Planning and Architecture, Vijayawada; School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal; Maulana Azad National Institute of Technology
Click here to get list of 15 Institutes Documenting the Projects & 47 Smart Cities (Annexure 1)
Key Points
i.The SCM’s urban projects are lighthouse projects to other aspiring cities. Since 2015, the 100 Smart Cities have been developing 5,151 projects with an outlay of Rs. 2,05,018 crore. Click here to read about SCM
ii.AKAM is an initiative of the Government of India (GoI) to celebrate and commemorate 75 years of progressive India. It commenced on March 12, 2021 which starts a 75-week countdown to our 75th anniversary of Independence and will end on August 15, 2022.
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About Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs (MoHUA):
Union Minister– Hardeep Singh Puri (Constituency- Uttar Pradesh)
Minister of State (MoS)– Kaushal Kishore (Constituency- Mohanlalganj, Uttar Pradesh)
About National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA):
Director– Hitesh Vaidya
Headquarters– New Delhi, Delhi
