KOCHI: The much hyped nationwide video conferencing held by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the Smart City Mission projects ended as a damp squib for the Kochi Corporation as it failed to get the video link with the Prime Minister for presenting the road map of the civic body for the Smart City project in Kochi.
The city presented its road map before the arrival of the Prime Minister to inaugurate the announcement of the first year of Smart City Mission projects through video conferencing from Shiv Chatrapati Sports Complex in Pune on Saturday. Kochi Mayor Soumini Jain said that the hope of presenting Kochi's plans before the PM failed to materliase as the video conferencing link was established only with Chief Ministers of Odisha and Rajasthan.
The video presentation made by Kochi before the arrival of the Prime Minister was watched by the large gathering in Pune. The Smart City mission plan of Kochi focused mainly on the integrated transport plan and seamless urban mobility, environment-friendly walkways and non-motorised transport and water management.
The presentation also highlighted the plans to improve civic services as part of the mission including the proposal for multi-purpose smart card for different transport systems and the waste-to-energy plant at Brahmapuram. Apart from Mayor Soumini Jain, District Collector M. G. Rajamanickam, and Deputy Mayor T. J. Vinod and senior officials of the civic body attended the live-webcast of the event from the office of the National Informatics Centre at the District Collectorate in Kakkanad.
