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Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission!
On 3rd December 2005, Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) was launched by the Prime Minister to encourage cities to initiate steps to bring about improvement in the existing service levels in a financially sustainable manner.
Main objectives of the mission, inter alia, include -planned development of identified cities semi-urban areas, outgrowths and urban corridors and improved provision of basic services to the urban poor.
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The mission has subsumed the following on-going schemes of the Ministry: Infrastructure Development in Mega Cities, Integrated Development of Small and Medium Towns and Accelerated Urban Water Supply Programme.
The mission embraces two sub-missions: one on urban infrastructure and governance and the other on basic services for the urban poor. Cities, Urban Agglomerations/Parastatals will be required to prepare detailed project reports for undertaking projects under identified areas.
Funds for the identified cities would be released to the designated State Nodal Agency, which in turn would leverage to the extent feasible, additional resources from the financial institutions/private sector/capital market. Private sector participation in development, management and financing of urban infrastructure would be clearly delineated.
The admissible components under the mission include urban renewal, water supply (including water de-salivation plants) and sanitation, sewerage and solid waste management, urban transport, development of heritage areas, preservation of water bodies etc. A provision of Rs 50,000 crore has been agreed to as Central assistance for JNNURM for a period of 7 years beginning from 2005-06.
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It is expected that on the completion of seven years of the mission period, the urban local bodies/ Parastatals will achieve following outcomes:
(i) Modern and transparent budgeting, accountings and financial management systems designed and adopted for all urban services and governance functions;
(ii) City-wide framework for planning and governance will be established and become operational;
(iii) All urban residents will be in a position to obtain access to a basic level of urban services;
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(iv) Financially self-sustaining agencies for urban governance and service delivery will be established, through reforms to major revenue instruments;
(v) Local services and governance will be conducted in a manner that is transparent and accountable to citizens;
(vi) e-Governance applications will be introduced in core functions of ULBs/Parastatals resulting in reduced cost and time of service delivery processes.
During 2006-07, an amount of Rs 2,500 crore has been provided for in the year 2006-07 for the submission on Urban Infrastructure and Governance. From April 2006 to February 2007, City Development Plans have been submitted in respect of 39 cities of which 33 have been appraised.
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The Memorandum of Agreement in respect of reforms agenda have already been negotiated and also signed in respect of 32 cities. In the mean time, 315 DPRs have been submitted under the mission of which 146 have been approved by the Central Sanctioning and Monitoring Committee of the Ministry of Urban Development.
Moreover, projects worth Rs 11,648 crore have been sanctioned and the additional Central assistance committed for the purpose is to the extent of Rs 5,583 crore.
The reform process of urban local bodies in India started rightly with the launching of the JNNURM. There is now a better appreciation at the state level of the importance of developing and sustaining the infrastructure through appropriate user charges.
When the JNNURM programme was launched by the Government of India in December 2005, it recognised the fact that mere funding of infrastructure projects in cities would not transform them.
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Reforms of the Urban local bodies, Parastatal and the State level was very much essential for a city’s sustainable, long term growth. Through adoption of proper technology, urban local bodies need to reengineer and reactive their processes as per changing needs. States have to eliminate legal, institutional and financial constraints which are largely impeding investment in urban infrastructure and services.
JNNURM specifies 13 mandatory and 9 optional reforms, which states and identified cities of the country have to execute over the seven-year mission period. The CRISIL Awards for Excellence in Municipal Initiatives for City’s Commitment to Reforms’ are being launched in partnership with the Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India.
In 2007-08, an amount of Rs 2,805 crore has been provided for the submission on Urban Infrastructure and Governance. A total number of 279 projects (as on January 1, 2008) have been sanctioned at an approved total cost of Rs 25,287.0 crore for 51 cities out of 63 listed mission cities across 26 states.
During this year 74 projects have been approved which will cost Rs 8,301.64 crore and a sum of Rs 1,172.55 crore has also been released as Additional Central Assistance (ACA) in the form of admissible central share.
While sanctioning these urban projects highest priority has been accorded to sectors that directly benefit the common man and the urban poor, viz., water supply, sanitation and storm water drainage. Ninety projects are expected to be completed within December 2008.
In order to provide reforms-linked Central assistance to State Governments for the development of urban infrastructure, a Mission Mode approach was adopted in 63 selected cities, which include cities with 4 million plus population (7), cities with 1 million plus but less than 4 million population (28 cities) and other selected cities like State capitals and cities of religious/historic and tourist importance (28).
During 2009, two more cities, that is Tirupati and Porbandar were included as Mission Cities, taking the total number to 65. The Mission has two components, Urban Infrastructure and Governance (UIG) and Basic Services for the Urban Poor (BSUP). UIG Sub-component addresses the needs of Urban infrastructure.
During 2008-09, the seven-year allocation for Additional Central Assistance (ACA) for the UIG component was increased from Rs 25,500 crore to Rs 31,500 crore. Since inception and till December 2009, as many as 515 projects across 31 States at a cost of Rs 58,038 crore were sanctioned under the UIG, comprising interalia 147 water supply projects, 108 sewerage projects, 70 drainage/storm water drainage projects, 41 solid waste management projects, 85 roads/flyovers projects and 34 urban transport projects. So far, the committed ACA under the UIG for approved projects is Rs 27,040.3 crore, against which Rs 10,261.7 was released till December 2009.
In order to develop urban services, a total investment of Rs 3,35,350 crore has been envisaged by the mission cities. It is observed from the sectoral composition in the City Development Plans (CDP) submitted for 63 million cities that the share of urban transport in the investment envisaged is 51 per cent, water supply 14 per cent, sewerage13 per cent, drainage6 per cent and solid waste management3 per cent.
It is recognised that there is a need to strengthen capacity building through experience sharing among the mission cities. Accordingly, a programme called PEARL (Peer Experience and Reflective Learning) was launched on January 31, 2007.
The main objective of the PEARL programme is to create networks between JNNURM cities for cross learning and knowledge sharing on urban reforms and city governance for achieving the objectives of the mission successfully so as to make the cities more livable economically vibrant and environmentally sustainable.
In addition to the above, there is another component of JNNURM meant for the remaining small towns which is called Urban Infrastructures Development Scheme for Small and Medium Towns (VIDSSMT). This scheme was launched in December 2005 for a period of seven years with the same broad objective.
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