As we all know In a determined bid to recast the urban landscape of the country to make urban areas more liveable and inclusive besides driving the economic growth, the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi approved Central Government spending of about Rs 50,000 crore on urban development under AMRUT Scheme over the next five years.
Also AMRUT Scheme replaced the UPA Government’s JNNURM Scheme
Learnings from the earlier Mission have shown that infrastructure creation should have a direct impact on the real needs of people, such as providing taps and toilet connections to all households. This means that the focus should be on Infrastructure creation.
In this backdrop, Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) is a step forward in the direction. The purpose of AMRUT is to:
(i) ensure that every household has access to a tap with assured supply of water and a sewerage connection;
(ii) increase the amenity value of cities by developing greenery and well maintained open spaces (e.g. parks);
(iii) reduce pollution by switching to public transport or constructing facilities for non-motorized transport (e.g. walking and cycling).
Progress Till Date : Under AMRUT, a total of 539 projects with an investment of Rs.7,305.88 cr have taken off. These include 125 projects to ensure water supply connections to all households besides enabling water supply at the normative 135 litres per head per day in 91 cities at a total cost of Rs.3,727.79 cr and 50 sewerage and septage management projects and augmenting water supply in another 39 mission cities at a cost of Rs.3,207.85 cr. Another 329 projects with a cost of Rs.9,506.15 cr are close to being awarded for implementation. Development of open and green spaces is in progress in almost all the 500 mission cities. Investment of Rs.30,657 cr has been approved under Atal Mission during 2016 for improving infrastructure relating water supply, sewerage networks, storm water drains, urban transport with focus on non-motorized transport and open and green spaces.
Note: AMRUT makes States equal partners in planning and implementation of projects, thus actualizing the spirit of cooperative federalism. (As earlier practice of project-by-project sanctions was initially replaced by approval of the State Annual Action Plan once a year and then recently a very important decision of, approval of action plans for the next three years in one go, was taken.)
