Know The Countries That Are Helping India Become Smart

After the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government at the Centre announced its plans to develop 100 smart cities, various countries have been lining up to help India achieve the target. While 98 cities have so far been shortlisted to be developed, the names of the other two are to be announced at a later stage. Of those, 20 cities are selected in 2015-16 are to be provided funding in the first phase.

PropGuide takes a look at the countries that have pledged their support to make Indian cities smart:

• Singapore has shown its interest in helping India in realising its ambitious dream of developing all the 100 smart cities. It has offered to help develop Amravati, the new state capital of Andhra Pradesh as a smart city. The country is also looking at re-engineering and upgrading the transportation sector and retro-fitting the older Indian city.

• Canada has offered to help in providing solution to residential problem by providing wooden multi-storey housing complexes. 

• Japan has signed a memorandum of understanding with India to develop Varanasi as a smart city. 

• Germany has signed up with India to develop Bhubaneswar (Odisha), Kochi (Kerala) and Coimbatore (Tamil Nadu). 

• The US' United States Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) has signed an agreement to develop Visakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh), Allahabad (UP) and Ajmer (Rajasthan) as smart cities. 

• Spain has proposed to cooperate with India in developing smart cities. The Barcelona Regional Agency of Spain has shown interest in exchanging technology with India.

• France has announced an investment of 2 billion euros in India to develop three cities -- Chandigarh, Puducherry and Nagpur -- as smart cities. 

• The UAE has committed itself to investing in the Smart City Project of India. An MoU has been signed between FICCI and the Federation of UAE for industrial and other ties between India and the UAE.

• China has shown interest in developing Pune as a smart city. It will be investing $2.5 billion in the city's security solutions and services. 

• Sweden, Israel, the Netherlands, United Kingdom and Hong Kong have also shown interest in investing in India for developing smart cities. The British High Commission has shown interest in Belgavi city and proposed developing round-the- clock drinking water supply mechanism in the city.

• Italy has shown interest in the smart city concept and decided to invest of $1.2trillion over the next 20 years in its own initiatives. The Italian companies will contribute in terms of design and technology for the smart cities, with services ranging from consultancy to actual building of infrastructure.