(Tribune)
The Dharamsala Smart City project announced and sanctioned in 2016 with a lot of fanfare along with other such projects across the country, has failed to take off. The problems that the project faced during the stint of the previous Congress government continue to paralyse the project even now. The project is still short of staff and the state government has not contributed its 50 per cent share.
Sources said development works worth Rs 2,100 crore had been planned under the Smart City project. Of these, the state government had dropped about Rs 600 crore worth of projects that were considered irrelevant. A major project that has been dropped is the construction of 555 single bedroom houses for urban homeless. The authorities are of the view that there were hardly any Himachali urban homeless and so constructing 555 houses was futile. Already, about 100 single-room houses constructed in Dharamsala were lying unallotted.
