Urgent need to mop up revenues of Mysuru City Corporation underlined

Mysuru: There is an urgent need to increase revenues of Mysuru City Corporation (MCC) to develop the Heritage City of Mysuru into a Smart City, said K. Sriram, National Vice-President of Builders Association of India (BAI). 

He was speaking at a seminar on ‘Smart Cities-Future Cities’ at Hotel Southern Star last evening. The seminar was organised by National Real Estate Development Council (NAREDCO), Mysuru. 

The MCC is perpetually cash-strapped and it depends on the State and Centre for every major work. “The MCC generates less than Rs. 200 crore as revenue per year and immediate measures have to be taken to increase the revenue to Rs. 500 crore to Rs. 700 crore in the next couple of years,” he said. 

The seminar focussed on branding the city as Smart City and exploring solutions in that direction. “We need to brand the city projecting our strengths and advantages to increase revenue of the city,” Sriram said.  

The revenue target of Mysuru is still within Rs. 200 crore and in comparison, cities like Mumbai have Rs. 30,000 crore in revenue and Pune Rs. 5,000 crore and even smaller centres like Vishakhapatnam has Rs. 900 crore in revenue, he said, adding Mysuru already has features of a smart city but to stay that way, the city needs to attract more revenue. 

NAREDCO hailed the Government’s Smart City announcement, saying the move would provide business opportunities for the real estate developers. The MCC, real estate sector and other stakeholders need to work in a coordinated manner towards achieving the Smart City goal, the speakers added. 

Citing his visit to Tianjin city in China, Sriram said that a visitor will be flabbergasted to see the development of the Chinese city with driver-less buses, end-to-end waste collection and disposal and other features. “There is no need to brood over Mysuru not being selected as Smart City but we must realise that Mysuru has its own identity and has many Firsts. We should feel proud and work towards achieving higher goals,” he said. 

“Some of the core infrastructure elements in a Smart City would include adequate water supply, assured electricity supply, sanitation, including solid waste management, efficient urban mobility and public transport, affordable housing, especially for the poor, robust IT connectivity and digitalisation, good governance, especially e-Governance and citizen participation. Also, there must be active involvement of private firms who can collaborate with the MCC in certain areas including waste disposal and solid waste management. We need to focus on these aspects,” Sriram added. 

Inaugurating the seminar, Mayor Pushpalatha Jagannath said that the MCC was ready to collaborate with private companies and software firms for the overall development of Mysuru. Private companies can come forward with their proposals to initiate new projects. “We are ready for talks,” she said. 

NAREDCO State President M. Satish Kumar, former President Manoj Lodha, Joint Secretary Nagesh Atharva, NAREDCO Mysuru Unit Chairman N. Divyesh, President T.G. Adisheshan Gowda, Dr. Kanwal of Green Building Consultants, Somashekar, Managing Director of PG Shetty Constructions, Deepak Lulla, Managing Director of Habitat Shelters, Architect Dr. Sujithkumar and others were present at the seminar.