the goan I network
PANAJI
At a time when the State government, politicians, all and sundry are gung-ho over naming projects, roads and their likes after the late Manohar Parrikar, one of the latter’s pet multi-crore projects -- the Smart City -- lies buried and forgotten, in utter neglect.
What’s more is that the Corporation of the City of Panaji (CCP) which has historically been at loggerheads over jurisdictional issues with the Imagine Panaji Smart City Development Limited (IPSCDL) is now eyeing to separately execute some of the individual projects of the Smart City plan and also corner its funds.
CCP commissioner Sanjit Rodrigues said the Smart City funds could be diverted to the Corporation for these projects which were envisaged by the now-in-hibernation IPSCDL.
Rodrigues made the comment while addressing the media alongside CCP Mayor Uday Madkaikar, on the recent junket six members from the CCP, including the commissioner-mayor duo went on to Dubrovnic, Croatia, ostensibly to study “smart” practices there and implement them here.
The smart practices they saw and perhaps studied, meanwhile, sound uncannily familiar to Panjimites who were fed with these grandiose ideas as part of the ‘Smart City’ plan, namely, “smart mobility”, “smart parking”, and the rather vague “citizen awareness.”
All these ideas and projects aren’t alien to Panjimites with whom IPSCDL and its officials have had lengthy “citizen consultation” over. The “smart parking” proposal was one such where citizens were explained and feedback taken at the Adil Shah Palace somewhere last year. The proposal however, did not see the light of day yet.
This co-operation between Panaji and Dubrovnic is part of a larger scheme being
undertaken across 13 cities in India (unrelated to the Smart City project cities) under the EU’s IUC scheme, where Indian cities tie up with European cities and implement their best practices.
Rodrigues said: “We have shortlisted some areas of co-operation after visiting Dubrovnic. One of the areas of co-operation is ‘smart mobility’ which will integrate Dubrovnic’s way of managing transport, traffic, and parking. We will take the best practices from there and incorporate these in our pay parking proposal for Panaji.”
Panjimites will now have to wait and watch to see in which direction the CCP’s latest “smart” proposal heads, although CCP has signed an agreement with Dubrovnic city council, and is in the process of giving the proposal shape.
It will then be sent to the European Union’s “International Urban Co-operation” (IUC) committee, Rodrigues said.
The process for this latest co-operation between Panaji and Dubrovnic is not a new one but began back in 2017-18 when Parrikar was Chief Minister, mayor Uday Madkaikar said.
Dubrovnic city officials had visited Panaji a long time back and the CCP team delayed making the trip to Croatia, Madkaikar claimed, adding that the delay has cost the city as it would have benefited from the co-operation much earlier.
The three-year contract signed with the city of Dubrovnic will end in 2020.
Rodrigues too admitted that some other of these 13 cities were way ahead of Panaji in implementation of these projects. Also, during the monsoon session of the Goa legislative assembly held in July-August this year, Chief Minister Pramod Sawant had sought to pacify Monserrate and assured him that a committee would be formed to review smart city projects.
He said, other sources of funding for these projects could possibly be funds expected from the 14th Finance Commission, the Corporation’s own funds, or through Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) funding.
Meanwhile, one of the reasons IPSCDL has gone into hibernation over the ‘Smart City’ projects is the objection to it overlapping on CCP’s jurisdiction from the new legislator of Panaji - Atanasio Monserrate. His panel which holds power in the CCP had raised a hue and cry over the IPSCDL not taking the civic body into confidence before starting works.
Keeping the CCP in the dark by the IPSCDL over its functioning and the manner in which its projects were being implemented had led to lack of accountability, was Monserrate’s and the civic body’s chief objection.
The committee, Sawant had said, would include the Panaji MLA as well as the city mayor. Madkaikar however said there has been no word yet on this committee either from the government or the CM as yet.
Monserrate could not be reached and the IPSCDL officials too seem to be in the dark over theirs and the fate of the ‘smart city’ projects.
Former Panaji MLA, Siddharth Kuncalienkar had been over-looking the smart city project as IPSCDL vice-chairman, a position he relinquished to contest the May bye-election post Parrikar’s death.
