Engage citizens to smarten city governance

Objective: Smart Cities Mission launched by Government of India in 2015 aims to promote sustainable and inclusive cities that provide core infrastructure and facilitates decent quality of life for the citizens. Emphasis is laid on good governance, especially e-Governance and citizen participation.The paper examines the challenges in people’s participation and identifies the factors that facilitate people’s involvement in enhancing smart governance. Prior Work: Underlining the importance of people in city development, a study was conducted when Jawahar Lal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission was launched in 2005. The research was further extended when the Smart Cities Mission emphasized on the significance of citizens’ engagement. The present paper is continuum of these researches. Approach: This paper focuses on citizens’ engagement process applied under Smart Cities Mission, and attempts to investigate whether citizens’ point of views are directly or indirectly reflected in the Mission implementation. The paper is premised on literature review supported by a few field level surveys, consultations and analyses. Results: Smart Cities Mission emphasizes on public participation; and recommends Information Communication Technologies and e-governance as tools to facilitate and enhance citizen engagement. However, digital divide and digital illiteracy are serious challenges. Besides, bureaucratic control, political intervention, and top-down approach characterize Indian city governments. This leads to more of ceremonial public participation. But, there are instances of visionary and dynamic city governments that encouraged constructive and effective citizen participation. Implications:The paper would serve for further intensive studies to: a. identify effective ways for people’s participation in a system dominated by powerful vested interest groups averse to change, and ; b. provide policy-makers thoughts for effecting meaningful public involvement. Value: The paper findings are, by and large, common for developing countries. The paper indicates the mode for citizen engagement to enable smart governance of cities.