New Delhi: Bhubaneswar has been adjudged as the Best Smart City in the East Zone less than 10 lakh population Category at the India Smart Cities Award Contest 2022 (ISAC 2022).
This has been informed by the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC).
“We are happy to announce that Bhubaneswar received the Best Smart City award at the India Smart Cities Award Contest 2022 – ISAC 2022”, the BMC tweeted.
The India Smart Cities Award Contest (ISAC) is organized under the Smart Cities Mission, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, Government of India. This is one of the important activities initiated under the Mission, where pioneering city strategies, projects and ideas are recognized to award exemplary performance, enable peer-to-peer learning and disseminate best practices. The ISAC recognizes and reward the cities, projects and innovative ideas that are promoting sustainable development across the 100 smart cities, as well as stimulating inclusive, equitable, safe, healthy and collaborative cities, thus enhancing quality of life for all.
In the past, the ISAC has witnessed three editions in 2018, 2019 and 2020. The fourth edition of the ISAC was launched in April 2022 during the ‘Smart Cities-Smart Urbanization’ event in Surat.
The ISAC 2022 award had a two-stage submission process consisting of ‘Qualifying Stage’, which involved overall assessment of the city’s performance, and the ‘Proposal Stage’ which required the smart cities to submit their nominations for six award categories as follows:
Project Awards: 10 different themes,
Innovation Awards: 2 different themes,
National/Zonal City Awards, State Awards, UT Award, and Partners Awards, 3 different themes
A total of 845 nominations were received for ISAC 2022 from 80 qualifying smart cities. These entries were evaluated in 5 stages.
In the first stage, a pre-screening of the 845 proposals was carried out. 50% (423 proposals) moved to the next stage.
In the second stage, for each award category top 12 proposals were identified by a jury of the National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA). In the third stage, each proposal proponent made a presentation to a panel of subject experts, leading to selection of Top 6 proposals.
Finally, in the fourth stage, top 6 proposals made an elaborate presentation to a jury headed by MoHUA directors and comprising subject matter experts. Post this fourth stage, top 3 proposals have been identified for each award category by the Apex Committee of Smart Cities Mission.
Of the total 845 applications received under the five awards categories, 66 final winners have been identified – 35 in Project Award, 6 in Innovation Award, 13 in National/Zonal City Award, 5 in State/UT Award and 7 in Partner Award categories.
The President of India will felicitate the winners of ISAC 2022 awards on 27th September 2023 at Indore, Madhya Pradesh.