Ludhiana best smart city in state, 48th in country
Nitin Jain
Ludhiana, October 19
Ludhiana has emerged as the best smart city in Punjab, got the first rank in the state and 48th in the country, the government has confirmed.
The latest rankings were released by the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) recently, Municipal Corporation Commissioner Sandeep Rishi shared this during a review of the Smart City Mission (SCM) projects here on Thursday.
Rajya Sabha MP from Ludhiana Sanjeev Arora reviewed the projects and directed the Commissioner to ensure the completion of the ongoing works at the earliest.
He disclosed that 52 projects worth Rs 210 crore had already been completed, 16 schemes worth Rs 549.1 crore were under execution and four works had been tendered at a cost of Rs 161.9 crore.
Rishi apprised Arora that the total allocated funds of Rs 889.25 crore, comprising Rs 441-crore Centre’s share and Rs 448-crore state share had already been received, of which Rs 768.26 crore had been utilised.
This time’s ranking was better for Ludhiana than 2020 when it was ranked at 54th spot in the country. Since then, Ludhiana’s ranking has been constantly improving. From 54th rank in 2020, Ludhiana had ranked 37th in 2021, 48th in 2022 and 32nd in January this year.
However, the latest ranking was 16 spots down than the previous one and 11 positions below the 2021 rank but a jump of 6 spots in the past four years.
Last year, Ludhiana was adjudged second best in Punjab with Jalandhar bagging the top spot in 2022. This time, Jalandhar has slipped to third rank in the state with 84th rank in the country while Amritsar has ranked 79th in the country and has stood second in Punjab.
Ludhiana — spread over 169 square km area with a population of 16.18 lakh as per 2011 Census — is among 100 cities in the country and three in Punjab, which were selected under the SCM to be developed as a smart city in the first round of the selection by the MoHUA in 2015.
