The Bhopal smart city project is hanging fire as the municipal corporation and the Bhopal Development Authority (BDA), two nodal agencies for the scheme, do not have any blueprint for it.
Also, they do not have any clue about relocation of the residents of North and South TT Nagar area where the project will come up.
The state government had earlier selected Shivaji Nagar and Tulsi Nagar areas for smart city, but following protests by the residents, the location for the project was shifted to north and south TT Nagar
In fact, when Hindustan Times sought information about the progress of work, both the agencies passed the buck to each other.
Chief executive officer (CEO) of smart city Bhopal, Chandramauli Shukla said, “While our plan is to develop the smart city, BDA will relocate the residents, and the work will begin only after that.”
However, before the government decision to shift the project to north TT Nagar, BDA had demolished 1,400 buildings to construct 4,308 apartments in the area, but the construction work stopped following the change of location for the smart city project.
CEO of BDA Neeraj Vashisht said, “We made a plan to build 4,308 ultramodern apartments in place of 1,400 old houses in TT Nagar, but after the area was chosen for smart city, our role came to an end; and it is the BMC which will relocate the residents.”
The smart city company, set up for developing the project, did not hold a single meeting after the change of location a month ago, and failure to hold any meeting might have been the reason for not making blueprint for the project, sources said.
While the smart city location was empty because of lack of planning, the officials were busy making arrangements for a meeting on the project at Noor-Us-Sabah Palace to be attended by corporators, builders, doctors and advocates, sources added.
