Shillong, July 1: Meghalaya has been allotted one "smart city" which would be selected from a range of cities and towns via a multi-stage selection and competition process.

Saying this here today, urban affairs minister M. Ampareen Lyngdoh said Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched the "smart cities mission" on June 25 where there would be 100 smart cities in the country chosen based on urban population and the number of towns in the states.

"Meghalaya has been allotted one smart city to be selected. The process of selection will be multi-stage," Ampareen informed.

In Stage I, she said, there would be shortlisting of cities by the states on the basis of conditions, precedent and scoring criteria.

"This will be intra-state in nature and the best cities enter the second round of the competition. The cities selected in the first round will be sent by the state to the Union ministry of urban development and thereafter, the ministry would announce the list of the cities (till then the number 100 is known but the cities selected are not known)," she added.

Stage II of the competition will be the "challenge round" wherein the cities selected prepare their proposals for participation in the "city challenge".

The Smart City Plan (SCP), Ampareen said, would be designed after consultations with the stakeholders and residents and should have a clear model of financing.

"This is then submitted to the ministry for consideration. The winning cities then will start acting on their plan and those who do not get selected will have to start working on redeveloping their SCP. The ministry will then provide handholding for upgrading the proposals before consideration," the minister said.

She said the "smart cities mission" would operate as a central sector scheme and financial support would be for an initial period of five years at Rs 100 crore per city per year.

The Centre and the matching contribution by the states/urban local bodies will meet only part of the project cost. The balance needs to be mobilised from financial institutions, convergence of other schemes, urban local bodies' resources, private sectors and others.

"This is the first time that a government programme has been formulated using a challenge or competition method to select cities for funding and using a strategy of area-based development," Ampareen said.