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Making Dharamsala a smart city

IIT-Roorkee, CII offer their expertise

SHIMLA: As the Urban Development Department is ready to create the special purpose vehicle Dharamsala Smart City Corporation, the Netherlands Embassy, IIT-Roorkee and the CII have offered to provide the expertise in various areas to develop the city.



Pratibha Chauhan

Tribune News Service

Shimla, April 29

As the Urban Development Department is ready to create the special purpose vehicle Dharamsala Smart City Corporation, the Netherlands Embassy, IIT-Roorkee and the CII have offered to provide the expertise in various areas to develop the city.

The CII has already given its letter of support offering all technical expertise for undertaking various works in the field of urban transport, solid waste management, streetlighting and other high-end services to residents. Though the final confirmation of Dharamsala being selected in the next list of Smart Cities will be made by May 15, with the town ranking at the seventh position in a list of 23 probables, the selection is almost certain.

“The HP State Council of the CII has already given its letter of support and the Embassy of the Netherlands has also conveyed its desire to associate with the Smart City, but a final decision on all this will be taken once we float the project Dharamsala Smart City Corporation,” said JM Pathania, Director, Urban Development. He added that similar offers had come from IIT-Roorkee, Indian Institute of Technology-Mandi and National Institute of Technology, Hamiprur.

Pathania said about Rs 1,000 crore would be spent on developing Dharamsala as a Smart City over five years. The Union Ministry of Urban Development would provide funds to the tune of Rs 1,000 crore, Rs 670 crore would be raised through private-public partnership (PPP) and about Rs 265 crore through convergence with Central schemes.

Once the approval from the Centre was received on Dharamsala being in the second list of cities, global tenders would be invited for having a multi-model transport system replete with passenger and travel information.

The decision to upgrade Dharamsala Municipal Committee into a corporation was also taken up with an eye on the selection of the town under the Smart City project. The decision had generated a lot of heat with residents of Shimla crying foul and the Mayor and Deputy Mayor of the Shimla MC moving court on the issue.

Dharamsala is the district headquarters of Kangra and enjoys the unofficial status of the second capital as the government moves here during winters when the brief Assembly session is held here. For this purpose, the town also has a Vidhan Sabha complex.

In fact, Dharamsala has earned global recognition with Tibetan spiritual leader and Nobel laureate Dalai Lama making McLeodganj his abode for the last almost 50 years. The presence of the Dalai Lama here is the biggest reason behind the huge foreign tourist arrivals.

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