A tea estate land on the outskirts of the city will be bought to develop a smart city in Dehrdaun spread over an area of 1,200-1,900 acres, Uttarakhand government said today.
As Dehradun is one of the 98 cities in India identified in the first phase for the Centre's ambitious smart city project, negotiations are in the final stages for buying land for the project from two tea companies whose estates are located in the Shimla bypass area of the city, Uttarakhand Urban Development Minister Pritam Singh Panwar told reporters.
The state government has already given its nod for buying land from the two tea companies and talks with them will be concluded in a day or two.
A project will be forwarded to the Centre before December 15 which is the deadline set by the Centre for the purpose, he said.
A total of Rs 500 crore will be given by the Centre for the project at the rate of Rs 100 crore per annum and the rest of the funds will have to be raised by the state government out of its own resources, the Minister said.
Chairman of Mussoorie-Dehradun Development Authority, the state government apppointed nodal agency for implementation of the project, R Meenakshi Sundaram said as per the Centre's guidelines it is mandatory to have at least 250 acres of land for a smart city project but a proposal of a smart city spread over an area of at least 1,200 acres in Dehradun is being sent to the Centre.
Four rounds of talks have already been held so far with
Dehradun Tea Company for 1,200 acres of land and with East Hopman company for 700 acres of land, the MDDA Vice Chairman said, adding that the talks are in the final stages now and likely to be concluded in a day or two.
According to a rough estimate, Rs 2,300 crore will have to be spent over buying 1,900 acres of land for the purpose, Sundaram said.
Hudco has agreed to grant a loan of Rs 2,200 crore for Dehradun smart city project and at MDDA's next meeting a formal aggrement in this regard will be given, he said.
A joint undertaking with China's Tongji University which has expertise in architecture and town planning will be floated with shares in the ratio of 60:40 for Dehradun smart city project, he said.
An MoU with the Chinese University in this regard will be signed on December 11.
A distinctive feature of the proposed Dehradun Smart City will be that it will be developed as a knowledge city with a number of educational institutions located there and a large area within its peripheries reserved as "Green Area Tea Estate", Sundaram said.
