NEW DELHI: As part of the ‘Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav’ celebrations across the nation, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA), Government of India, in collaboration with the Smart Cities Mission (SCM), launched ‘Smart cities and Academia towards Action and Research (SAAR)’. It is a joint initiative of MoHUA with the National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA), and some of the leading academic institutes of the country.
15 premiere planning and architecture institutes of the country will work together with SCM to document their best and landmark projects. The document will contain learnings from the best practices and will provide opportunities for engagement on urban development projects. Since the start of SCM, the selected 100 cities are developing 5151 projects worth Rs 2,05,018 crore.
As per the first activity under SAAR, they will prepare a compendium of 75 lighthouse projects of India under SCM. They will be innovative and multi-sectoral, and the project celebrates 75 years of Indian independence. The compendium will serve as the first point of reference for future research in the field. 75 projects under the compendium are from across 47 smart cities.
NIUA and MoHUA will facilitate the linkages between these institutions and SCM, regarding the documentation of specific landmark projects. Teams of students and mentors from these premiere institutions will visit the 47 smart cities to understand and document these projects.