Context: The Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry named Indore the best city and Madhya Pradesh the best state in the Smart Cities Mission in its India Smart Cities Awards 2022.

About Smart Cities Mission:

• It is an urban renewal and retrofitting programme launched by the Government of India to develop smart cities and make them citizen friendly and sustainable.
• It was launched in 2015 with the main objective of promoting cities that provide core infrastructure, clean and sustainable environment and give a decent quality of life to their citizens through the application of ‘smart solutions’.
• 100 cities have been selected to be developed as Smart Cities through a two-stage competition.

Smart Cities Award 2022:

• Cities: Indore won the best city with Surat and Agra named second and third best among cities.
• States: Madhya Pradesh won the best and Tamil Nadu second in states, with the third prize being shared by Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.
• Union Territories: Chandigarh won the overall award in the Union Territory category.Basis of Ranking: The cities were selected based on their ranking in terms of progress of projects, project outcomes and presentations submitted for the awards.
• Category-wise Awards:
  • Built Environment: Coimbatore’s project of restoration and renovation of lakes.
  • Economy: Jabalpur won the award for its incubation centre in the economy category. 
  • Governance: Chandigarh’s e-governance services.
• Integrated Command and Control Centers (ICCC): It is operational in all 100 Smart Cities and work as the brain and nervous system for city operations, using technology for urban management.
• The urban services have significantly improved in diverse fields like crime tracking, safety and security of citizens, transport management, solid waste management, water supply, disaster management etc.

News Source: The Indian Express