Only 33 per cent of the total 5,151 Smart City Mission projects have been completed or are under implementation, utilising 25 per cent of the envisaged investment.

The creation of smart cities was a major promise by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the run-up to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Projects worth ₹2,05,018 crore have been included by the selected 100 cities in their Smart City proposals.

According to data presented by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs to the Lok Sabha, 2,342 projects (45 per cent) worth ₹90,929 crore have been tendered, of which 1,675 projects (33 per cent) worth ₹51,866 crore are under implementation or have been completed.

This means that 3,476 projects (67 per cent) are either just tendered or have not even gone through the tendering process.

However, the Ministry told the Lok Sabha: “The pace of implementation of projects has picked up significantly during the last one year. There has been a 290 per cent increase in projects tendered, 332 per cent increase in projects grounded/completed and 479 per cent increase in projects completed since October 2017.”

The Smart City projects are executed through the convergence of resources from Central/State governments/local bodies and external funds. Public-private partnerships (PPP) are also expected to chip in with 20 per cent of the funding.

The Centre is supposed to give financial support to the extent of ₹500 crore each to these cities over a period of five years, and an equal amount is to be contributed by the State/Urban Local Body (ULB). So far, ₹13,846 crore has been released to State governments/Union Territories.

“It takes around 12-18 months to set up a special purpose vehicle (SPV), procure project management consultants (PMC), hire necessary people, call tenders and issue work orders,” the Ministry added. All 100 cities have incorporated SPVs; 91 have set up PMCs and all 100 have constituted city-level advisory fora.

The 20 cities that were selected in round one in 2016 are expected to complete their projects by 2019-20 or 2020-21, while the 40 cities in round two have to meet the deadline of 2019-20/2021-22. Another 30 cities in round three have to meet the target by 2020-21/2021-22, while the remaining cities, from round four, will complete their projects by 2020-21/2022-23.