24X7 availability of power and water, effective waste collection and disposal system amongst the top citizen asks.
New Delhi. LocalCircles (http://www.localcircles.com), a national citizen engagement platform recentlyshared collective insights from citizens of the 70+ selected smart cities of India on what they want from the smart city mission for their city.
The online citizen communities were enabled for over 160 cities in June 2015 upon the launch of the smart cities mission bringing together citizens in these cities to discuss what it would take for their city to become a smart city on the ground and other local issues related to civic, traffic, law/order, governance, emergency response, health, etc.
While over 5,000 inputs were received across the 70+ selected smart city communities and via the national community, the key takeaways are the following:
- Indian smart city definition should be developed in the context of India
- Citizens have not been consulted in selection of Smart Cities and must be involved in the selection, ratings and evaluation of Swachh Bharat, AMRUT and Smart City initiatives for their city
- Almost 100% of the Urban Local Bodies today do not have the skills/machinery to execute a smart city
- Swachh Bharat and AMRUT delivery is critical before the Smart City funds are released to a City
- Once Smart City funds are released, all details must be shared with the citizens via a public platform in a timely and transparent manner
Citizen Expectations from what their city should have when it turns into a Smart City:
- 24X7 supply of Power and Water
- Effective waste collection and disposal system
- Efficient Public Transportation
- Good Air Quality
- Citizen Oriented Governance
- Smart Policing and very low crime rate
- Disaster and Emergency Readiness infrastructure
- Over 75% planned housing and roads
- Availability of jobs
- Good education, health and recreation infrastructure.
“These local, city level online citizen communities have been set up with the vision that urban local bodies will be able to easily seek citizen inputs on their initiatives, invite them to on the ground events, utilise citizen expertise as fit, update them on progress and challenges and truly make smart cities dream a reality with citizen participation”, said Sachin Taparia, Chairman and CEO of LocalCircles.
