 "Solid, waste water treatment key to urban development: Modi")
Speaking at the National Summit on Inclusive Urban Development at Gandhinagar's Mahatma Mandir on Thursday, Modi said that he gave the idea to the Prime Minister of choosing 500 cities all over India where the focus would be on solid waste management and waste water treatment.
"The water treated through waste water treatment in urban areas can be used to solve water woes in rural areas. This can solve the rural-urban conflict. In Gujarat, we came up with a new concept called 'Rurban'. It is the merging of the spirit of the village with the advanced amenities of an urban area," Modi said.
More From This Section
Instead of treating urbanisation as a burden or a challenge, Modi called for treating it as an opportunity and a matter of strength.
"We keep expressing concerns about villages reducing and the number of people in cities increasing. Urbanisation is not something on which we can shed tears. It is not a challenge. Why not consider it as a strength? Once you see it like an opportunity, work can be done effectively and there will be great results."
Modi emphasised that with urbanisation happening at a great pace, the old mindset cannot be used to address it. "What is needed is invigorating our approach with things like latest technology and modern initiatives like solid waste management, waste water treatment," he said.
Giving an example of Japan motivating its citizen for 2020 Olympics, Modi called for similar motivation of Indian citizens for two future events. Modi urged the people to look at 2022, when India will celebrate 75th year of Independence and asked them to think on how they dream their city to be in 2022.
"The other is to work towards clean cities keeping in mind the 150th birth anniversary celebrations of Mahatma Gandhi, who gave lot of importance to cleanliness during his lifetime," he added.
Modi also called for a shift from PPP model to PPPP model of involving 'people' in urban development. "Instead of public-private partnership, urban development should happen on people-public-private partnership mode," he said.
The one day summit saw delegates from 26 states of India, over 400 districts and many mayors, deputy mayors and other officials from various Indian cities.