Govt gives three-year fund approval for urban mission

Govt gives three-year fund approval for urban mission NEW DELHI: The Centre has decided to junk annual approvals for action plans under the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation, better known as AMRUT, and given the go-ahead for plans scheduled for the remaining three years of the five-year scheme in one go. AMRUT focuses on ensuring water supply

and improving the sewerage network and drainage systems in cities.The one-go clearance is aimed at allowing the states to undertake projects with a "comprehensive" plan in place, the Union urban development ministry said. "We have taken a very important decision... Rather than the usual practice of sanctioning plans every year, we decided to approve them for the remaining three years of the mission in one go," urban development secretary Rajiv Gauba said.

The plans cleared included those for 14 states, including Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Punjab. With this, the Union urban development ministry has approved about 85% of the plans under the mission, under which the government seeks to invest Rs 1 lakh crore by 2019-20 on projects meant for 500 cities with a population of over 1 lakh.

Gauba said the new practice was launched to enable states to plan projects in a "comprehensive and holistic manner", and for the timely execution of work. He added, however, that the plans for the scheme's final three years were being approved after verifying the progress of plans cleared during the last and current financial years. He said the release of funds would be linked to the implementation of urban governance reforms by city and state authorities, including e-governance, improved efficiency of water and power use as well as revenue collection, single-window clearance for construction permits, and credit ratings for municipal bodies.

"We expect most of the 500 mission cities to be credit rated by March next year, and the 57 cities with a population of over one million to put in place online single-window clearance mechanisms by March next year," he said.

Gauba said plans for the remaining projects under AMRUT, worth about Rs 16,000 crore, would be approved by the end of next month.