Smart Citizen Consultations on MyGov
In 2015, the Government of India launched the Smart Cities Challenge to accelerate and inspire solutions to increase economic opportunity, improve quality of life, and create more responsive government. The Challenge will distribute central government funding to 100 cities over three years as part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious new Smart Cities Mission.
The India Smart Cities Challenge is a competition for municipal leaders and their partners to promote economic opportunity in India, improve governance, and produce better results for residents. During the competition, cities will formulate a unique vision, mission and plan that reflect their local context, resources, and the priorities of citizens. The best ideas will be selected for funding in Round One. Remaining cities will fine-tune their ideas and resubmit in subsequent rounds of the competition.
One of the very important aspects on which the cities in the challenge would be judged is the transparency, thoroughness and the inclusiveness of their citizen consultation during their Smart City plan preparation process. A Smart City proposal will include a bold new vision for the city, a pan-city initiative drawing inspiration from smart city solutions and an area based development plan which can be, depending on the local context, one of the three approaches – retrofitting, redevelopment or greenfield development. Pro-active citizen consultation is vital for formulating each of these plans and at all stages.
MyGov, Government of India’s online citizen engagement tool, has been identified by the Ministry of Urban Development as one very important part of the process for citizen consultation. In this regard, appended below are two documents which will explain in detail the citizen consultation process that will unfold through MyGov:
1. Ministry of Urban Development’s (MoUD) Office Memorandum (OM) on Citizen Consultation
MoUD issued an Office Memorandum on 23rd September 2015, to the Principal Secretaries (UD) of all the Sates and Union Territories detailing the citizen consultation process along with the various MyGov activities that can be undertaken. This OM is appended below for reference: MoUD Guideline on Citizen Consultation
2. Letter by CEO, MyGov to all Municipal Commissioners taking part in the Smart Cities Challenge
Subsequent to the OM by MoUD, CEO MyGov wrote a letter to the the Municipal Commissioners of the 98 Smart Cities that are participating in the challenge. This letter details the entire MyGov process along with timelines. This letter is appended below: MyGov CEO Letter to Municipal Commissioners
Smart Cities is an ambitious plan of the Government of India and its transformative potential will not be realized without widespread public participation at all stages of the development of Smart Cities. MyGov invites all citizens to actively participate in the various activities that are being undertaken.
All the activities in the Smart City Group on MyGov can be accessed through this link: https://mygov.in/group/moud-smart-cities//
