Mayor gets corporators on smart city bandwagon

HUBBALLI: In this age that %glorifies short attention spans, mayor Shivu Hiremath has struck gold: create awareness, albeit without being dreary.
On his return from the Vibrant Gujarat Summit-2015, which served as a platform to share knowledge on social and business transformations, held from January 11-13 in Gandhinagar, Gujarat, Hiremath couldn't wait to pass on the ideas to the corporators to put the city on the shortlist for the Centre's 'smart cities' project.So inspired was he by a seminar at the summit - Smart Cities for the Next Generation - that he got himself a VCD of the five-hour session. The catch, though, was to be able to convince all 67 city corporators and heads of different departments of the Hubballi-Dharwad Municipal Corporation (HDMC) to watch the VCD.
A li'l snip here, a li'l snip there
The mayor then hit upon an idea: why not edit the seminar down to an hour-long session, burn it on VCDs and distribute them among all stakeholders in the civic body? The abridged versions will be given out.
Hiremath explains that the Vibrant Gujarat Summit gave him an opportunity to hash out ideas with his peers from across the world. Around 750 mayors and commissioners from Brazil, the UK, Russia, Australia, Scotland, Canada, the USA and Israel, among others, participated in the summit.
He says he was quite taken with a seminar on planning and management of urban areas conducted by the urban development department of Gujarat. "In light of the central government's decision to turn 100 towns and cities into 'smart cities', the seminar was quite significant for mayors and commissioners from India. Since Hubballi is one of the strong contenders to earn the tag of 'smart city', it was imperative to learn the parameters to getting shortlisted." The organizers of the summit have sent the mayor a VCD of that seminar, which runs into five hours. "I am reducing it a one-hour-long or one-and-a-half-hour-long session that can fit on one VCD," says Hiremath. He adds that HDMC has already submitted an application to the Centre on considering the twin cities for its smart cities project. "A meeting of corporators and officials will soon be organized to ways to turn Hubballi-Dharwad smart cities."
The mayor says the summit helped him widen his perspectives on the smart cities project. "I used to think that developing physical infrastructure is enough to become a smart city. At the summit, I realized that the concept of a smart city covers aspects like employment creation, police and traffic control, education and water supply, among others. I'm hoping that the VCD will encourage corporators and civic officials would help them get tuned into the needs of the project."
The VCD will also highlight features of smart cities across the world. SH Naregal, special officer, HDMC, says the VCDs will be distributed among all corporators and officials soon after a meeting, at which the mayor will share his observations from the summit.