Union Urban Minister Venkaiah Naidu has said that Kohima as a Smart City would definitely boost the economy and social infrastructure of Nagaland.

The Centre’s ambitious Smart City mission is an innovative initiative to drive economic growth and improve the quality of life of the people by enabling local development and harnessing technology as a means to create and offer better services for citizens, he said

All the selected cities would have to prepare city level Smart City plans, which would be evaluated in the second stage of competition based on a broad set of criteria to pick up the top scoring 20 cities for financing during this financial year, Naidu said.

He said funds would be released to those 20 cities by the end of this year, adding that others would be asked to improve upon the identified deficiencies before participating in the next two rounds of competition.

Cities selected during the second stage of competition would be provided with financial assistance from the Centre. The funds will amount to Rs.2 billion in the first year followed by Rs.1 billion each year during the next three years.

The prime objective of the Smart City mission is to enhance the quality of urban life by addressing deficiencies in core infrastructure, Naidu said. Making Smart Cities would be a challenging task and states and urban local bodies have to rise to the challenge.