The event was graced by Tokhan Sahu, Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs, as the Guest of Honour. Also present were Srinivas Katikithala, Secretary, MoHUA; Satinder Pal Singh, Additional Secretary, MoHUA; Kuldip Narayan, Joint Secretary and Mission Director (Housing for All/Housing Division); Shombi Sharp, United Nations Resident Coordinator in India; senior MoHUA officials; CMDs of autonomous organisations; and representatives from UN agencies, Housing and Urban Development Corporation (HUDCO), and National Housing Bank (NHB).

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The MoU outlines key performance parameters, including financial ratios and non-financial indicators such as procurement through GeM, support to MSEs, CSR expenditure, among others, with ‘Excellent’ level targets finalized by the Department of Public Enterprises, Ministry of Finance.

The MoU was signed between Shri Srinivas Katikithala, Hon’ble Secretary, MoHUA, and Shri Sanjay Kulshrestha, Chairman & Managing Director, HUDCO, in the presence of senior officials from the Ministry – Ms. Roopa Mishra, Joint Secretary & Mission Director (SBM-U), and Shri Sanjeet, Joint Secretary & Financial Advisor, MoHUA – along with HUDCO Directors, Shri M. Nagaraj, (Director -Corporate Planning), and Shri Daljeet Singh Khatri, (Director- Finance).

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CMD HUDCO Sanjay Kulshrestha stated that HUDCO can play a significant role in supporting the government’s efforts to ensure affordable housing for all.

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Understanding the need to accelerate change for safe sanitation, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) is all set to roll out a month-long Clean Toilets Challenge on 17th Nov., with an aim to focus on ensuring functionality and sustainability of CT/PTs and to identify the best models, efficient restroom facilities, ensuring their continuous upkeep, refurbishment, beautification and ease of access.

Keeping in line with this very motive the Clean Toilets Challenge will be run between the 19th Nov (World Toilet Day) to 22nd Nov as a run up to the Good Governance Day, when the best model toilets will be identified, felicitated and shared for early replicability by other cities.

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Shri Manoj Joshi, Secretary, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA), and Shri R. Subrahmanyam, Secretary, Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment (MoSJE) jointly chaired the webinar which was attended by State Mission Directors of SBM-U, as well as Commissioners of leading cities in this initiative including AMRUT (Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation) Cities.

Congratulating States and cities for their efforts, Shri Manoj Joshi and Shri. R. Subrahmanyam highlighted the need for all cities and States to remain committed to the cause of ‘SafaiMitra Suraksha’. To provide impetus to the ongoing efforts towards mechanization and safety of workers, both Ministries jointly launched ‘NAMASTE’ (National Action for Mechanized Sanitation Ecosystem) Scheme to enhance occupational safety, improved access to safety gears and machines, provide skilled wage opportunities, and focus on continuous capacity building while breaking the intergenerationality of sanitation work.

Talking about the newly launched ‘NAMASTE’ Scheme, Shri R. Subrahmanyam highlighted the need for Municipal Corporations to lead all ‘SafaiMitra Suraksha’ initiatives. Highlighting the support that MoSJE would be providing, he said, “MoSJE will assist in the setting up Project Management Units (PMUs) that will be equipped with special resources and skilled professionals. Today, 128 out of 500 AMRUT cities have declared themselves as ‘SafaiMitra Surakshit Shehar’, tomorrow all 500 must become so. My request to all of you is to take this forward and make it a reality. Together we will succeed.”

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Presiding the meeting, Shri Durga Shanker Mishra, Secretary, MoHUA said, “The progress made in PMAY(U) is significant. I urge States to work towards achieving the target of constructing 60 Lakh houses and grounding of 80 Lakh by the end of 2020.” Further, he also called for effective implementation of ARHCs by States/UTs. “ARHC is a transformative scheme. It will improve the quality of life of beneficiaries,” he said.
This was the first CSMC meeting during the COVID-19 pandemic. This reflects the importance the Government has attached to the objective of providing pucca houses to all eligible beneficiaries of Urban India by 2022 with the vision of ‘Housing for All’. Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) has laid renewed emphasis to accelerate housing construction and completion across the country within stipulated time under PMAY(U).

The states also put in their proposals for revision of projects due to various issues such as, of land, topographical hazards, inter-city migration, change of preferences of verticals, loss of lives etc.

With this, as on date, the total number of sanctioned houses under PMAY(U) is now 1.07 Crores as against the validated demand of 1.12 Crore.

About 67 Lakh houses are grounded for construction and more than 35 Lakh have been completed and occupied. Total investment under the Mission is Rs 6.32 Lakh Crore which has Central assistance of Rs 1.68 Lakh Crore of which Rs 72646 Crore of funds have been released.

The Meeting evinced tremendous response from the States/UTs on Affordable Rental Housing Complexes (ARHCs), a sub-scheme under PMAY (U) for Urban Migrants/Poor. The States/UTs were further familiarized with the Scheme and requested to take appropriate measures for its effective implementation. ARHCs are a major step towards fulfilling the goal of ‘AatmaNirbhar Bharat’.

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i. Encourage & Revive Non-Motorised Transport (NMT)-As most of the urban trips are clocked in under five kilometres, NMT offers perfect opportunity to implement in this COVID 19 crisis as it requires low cost, less human resource, easy & quick to implement, scalable and environment friendly.

ii. Recommencing Public Transport with greater confidence of Commuters-Public transport is the backbone in urban areas especially for the low/middle income commuters for which these services are the mainstay of their daily transit needs. However, it is imperative at this stage that transmission of infection through usage of public transport should be curbed by adopting the right sanitization, containment and social distancing measures.

iii. Active utilization of technology to curb the spread of virus- Enabling technologies such as Intelligent Transportation System (ITS), indigenous cashless and touch less system like BHIM, PhonePe, Google Pay, PayTM etc.and National Common Mobility Card (NCMC)will reduce human interaction, in operations of public transit systems.
The advisory has been issued in view of COVID-19 pandemic which has suddenly impacted our way of life and that of our local, regional and global transport systems.

1.Evidence shows that there is a steep drop in public transport ridership volumes by 90%. Further, it has been observed that there is upto 60% reduction in air pollution. Re-establishing the earlier level of ridership in public transport is a big challenge for cities, as people may be looking for more options especially personal modes that allow for safer travel in the post lockdown scenario.

2. In order to avoid resurgence of car and other private vehicle usage, many cities around the world have encouraged e-ticketing, digital payments and reallocating street space for cycling and pedestrians through street closures, creating Non-Motorized Transport (NMT) priority zones, pop-up bike lanes & sidewalks, providing parking and charging equipments and financing options to make cycling more accessible. Some of the important initiatives taken recently in view of COVID-19 to promote NMT by these cities are as follows:
• New York has added 40 miles of new NMT lanes to support cyclists;
• Oakland, USA has closed 10% of its streets for motor vehicles;
• Bogotá, Colombia has added 76 km of cycle overnight;
• In Milan, Italy, 22miles of streets has been transformed to cycling lanes
• Auckland, New Zealand has removed on-street car parking and built up 17 km of temporary bike lanes in addition to widening of existing bike and foot paths.Also, city has developed a program to fund pop up bike lanes;
• Promotion of bike sharing in China has led to 150% increase in trips nationwide during lockdown; and
• In UK, local businesses relocate road space for pedestrians to allow residents to respect social distancing guidelines, while queuing outside shops

3. Various studies conducted by MoHUA show that about 16-57% of urban commuters are pedestrian and about 30-40% of commuters use bicycles in the country depending on the size of the city. Considering this as an opportunity, elevating the priority of these modes in this testing times gives travellers another private vehicle alternative, which is clean, safe, secured particularly, if it is integrated with other modes and affordable for all. This area is one of the thrust areas of National Urban Transport Policy-2006[NUTP-2006]. It will also generate employment opportunity for the work force in NMT industry.

4. India has a robust 700 Kms of operational metro rail in 18 major cities and a BRT network of about 450 kms operational in 11 cities across the country carrying 10 million passengers daily. But due to the social distancing norms being practiced, their capacities would be utilized at 25 to 50 percent of pre-corona virus levels. Such dramatic and dynamic changes in demand and supply will require complementing these public transport systems with alternative modes of transit.

5. MoHUA has undertaken several rounds of discussions with the subject matter experts, Industry experts, operators, World Bank and other eminent urban transport experts in the country and other parts of world, who have clearly outlined, that there will be change in characteristic of urban mobility post COVID-19. With a sense of insecurity in the minds of the public in travelling in public transport during these testing times, in all possibilities, there will be increase in number of private vehicles on road, which will not only create pollution but eat away space for other modes of public transport besides adversely affecting road safety and increase air pollution level and serious congestions on the roads.

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Addressing the media, the Minister said, “The importance of sanitation and effective solid waste management has been brought to the forefront now due to the COVID crisis. In fact, it would not be an exaggeration to say that the present situation could have been much worse had it not been for the critical part that SBM-U has played in the last five years to ensure a high degree of cleanliness and sanitation in urban areas. Five years ago, we introduced Swachh Survekshan (SS), the annual cleanliness survey for urban India that has proven immensely successful when it comes to improving urban cleanliness through a spirit of healthy competition.

However, since it is a ranking system, several of our cities, despite doing exceptionally well, were not being recognized appropriately. The Ministry, therefore, devised the Star Rating Protocol for Garbage Free Cities – a comprehensive framework similar to our examination systems where each ward in every city must achieve a certain standard across 24 different components of solid waste management (SWM) and is graded based on overall marks received”.

He further added, “Our aim is to institutionalize as well as bring consistency and transparency when it comes to SWM. This certification is not only an acknowledgement of the clean status of Urban Local Bodies and strengthened SWM systems but also a mark of trust and reliability akin to universally known standards. Moreover, the performance of cities under the Star Rating Protocol is crucial as it carries significant weightage when it comes to their final assessment in Swachh Survekshan.”

The protocol has been devised in a holistic manner including components such as cleanliness of drains & water bodies, plastic waste management, managing construction & demolition waste, etc. which are critical drivers for achieving garbage free cities. While the key thrust of this protocol is on SWM, it also takes care of ensuring certain minimum standards of sanitation through a set of prerequisites defined in the framework.

Also present at the conference was Shri Durga Shanker Mishra, Secretary, MoHUA who added, “To ensure that the Protocol has a SMART framework, we developed a three-stage assessment process. In the first stage, ULBs populate their progress data on the portal along with supporting documents within a particular timeframe. The second stage involves a desktop assessment by a third-party agency selected and appointed by MoHUA. Claims of cities that clear the desktop assessment are then verified through independent field level observations. In the recent phase of Star Rating Assessment, 1435 cities applied. During the assessments, 1.19 crore citizen feedbacks and over 10 lakh geo-tagged pictures were collected and 5175 solid waste processing plants were visited by 1210 field assessors.

While 698 cities cleared the desktop assessment, 141 cities have been certified with Star Rating during field assessment. The low number of certifications signifies the rigorous and robust certification mechanism of the protocol”. Launching the revised protocol for the Star Rating Framework, Shri Mishra elaborated, “Our endeavor is to constantly revisit and strengthen the framework basis the feedback received from cities. The new protocol will consider ward-wise geo-mapping, monitoring of SWM value chain through ICT interventions like Swachh Nagar App and zone-wise rating in cities with population of 50 lakh+”.

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