The hopes of capital city making into the list of smart cities, thereby getting considerable amount from the Union government to upgrade its infrastructure, dashed on Thursday with the Union Ministry of Urban Affairs excluding Thiruvananthapuram from the list of first 98 cites announced.
The decision to leave out capital city from the Smart city project, would deprive it of Rs.500 crore in the next five years, a sum which could have given a boost to several infrastructure projects here.
The Centre has earmarked Rs.48,000 crore for development of 100 smart cities. Each smart city would get an assistance of Rs.100 crore a year for five years. The decision to exclude the city from the project has not gone down well with the ruling Left Democratic Front in the Corporation.
Mayor K. Chandrika told The Hindu that the State government “deliberately” gave additional five marks to Kochi while ranking certain parameters for being selected for the project. “It was a deliberate attempt. We knew from the beginning that the State government preferred Kochi. We have complained to the Chief Minister for duplicity at a time the capital city had found place on the top-ten list of Swachh Bharat rankings for 476 cities,” she said.
Though Thiruvananthapuram stood eighth (Kochi is in the fifth position) in rankings for 476 cities, the capital city came second, behind Bengaluru, in the rankings for capital cities, she added.
On the argument that Kochi was above the capital city in ranking for cities, she said Thiruvananthapuram achieved the distinction even after the closure of Vilappilsala waste treatment plant while Kochi had facility for garbage treatment.
However sources in the government said the decision to provide five marks more to Kochi was based on its proper and timely spending of Plan funds.
The marks were given on the basis of guidelines prescribed for selection procedure by the Union Ministry of Urban Affairs, the source said.
City would have got Rs.500 crore under project
Kochi spent Plan funds on time: officials
