With Salem City Municipal Corporation selected in phase II of the Smart Cities Mission, a special purpose vehicle (SPV)- a limited company under the Companies Act, 2013- would be formed for the implementation of the Rs. 1,908.60 crore worth projects.
The Corporation had on June 30, 2016 submitted Smart City Proposal (SCP) to the State government that was in turn forwarded to the Ministry of Urban Development.
The proposal had two major components, area-based development that focuses on developing two particular areas, while pan city focuses on development across the city.
In a public poll conducted to select the area, a total of 15,738 people participated. As many as 6,277 respondents voted for developing V.O.C Market area while 2,418 respondents voted for Old Bus Stand area.
The proposal focused on transport, creating commercial space, improving water supply and sanitation and creating open spaces in these two areas.
Pan city proposals focused on intelligent transport system and traffic management, e-planning portals and effective governance, video analytics-based surveillance, smart metering of water supply and electronic health records and creating city health portals.
The total cost of the proposal was Rs. 1,908.60 crore in which projects for area-based development was Rs. 1,481.10 crore while projects for pan city was Rs. 427.50 crore. Funding pattern would be Rs. 976 crore from the Central and State government for five years, Rs. 313 crore through convergence, Rs. 216 crore from various schemes and Rs. 619.60 crore to be obtained for projects to be implemented under Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode.
Officials said that a SPV will be created for implementing the projects that will plan, appraise, approve, release funds, implement, manage, operate, monitor and evaluate the projects. “The process of implementing the Smart City Mission starts up with the setting up of the SPV,” they added.
To celebrate the Corporation’s selection in the Phase II, Mayor S. Soundappan along with Corporation Commissioner K.R. Selvaraj, MLAs, executive engineers and employees distributed sweets to the public on Wednesday.
