Srinagar misses deadlines for ‘smart’ transformation

Azhar Qadri

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, July 18

The state’s summer capital, Srinagar, has missed crucial deadlines to transform into a Smart City as the Project Management Consultancy (PMC) has not been put in place till date. The deadlines were decided upon in the Smart City proposal of Srinagar, approved in June 2017, official sources said.

The missed deadlines include both the area-based development components as well as pan-city development components.

The Srinagar Smart City proposal had promised to transform the city into an eco-friendly, resilient and socio-economically vibrant city that would celebrate its natural and cultural heritage.

The components of utmost importance, which have missed the initially proposed deadlines, include the Rs 358-crore river bank development, part of the flood management programme, which was estimated to be completed by March this year.

The official sources, however, said the work has not even been initiated on this component till now.

“The Project Managenent Consultancy has not been put in place. It has to make the detailed project reports (DPRs) and initiate projects,” the sources said.

The setting up of PMC is a prerequisite and it is tasked to develop, manage and implement the Smart City projects.

The sources said the meeting of board of directors of Srinagar Smart City is scheduled later this month and it would take up the issue of setting up the Project Management Consultancy .

The Srinagar Smart City proposal, which was approved in the third round in June 2017, had proposed 98 projects across 15 segments of development in over a period of four years — of which two years have been lost already.

The project-wise milestones were worked out with short-term timeline of 2018, medium-term timeline of 2019 and long-term of 2022.

No consultancy

• The Srinagar Smart City proposal was approved in the third round in June 2017
• It had proposed 98 projects across 15 segments of development in four years, of which two have been lost already
• Sources said the city missed crucial deadlines as the Project Management Consultancy has not been put in place till date
• The consultancy is a prerequisite and is tasked to develop, manage and implement the Smart City projects