Global Business Forum Takes on Govt's Smart Cities Mission with Innovations

Global Business Forum an innovation platform conceptualised by IIT Bombay Alumni Association announced that it is planning to collaborate with the central government to provide solutions for enabling the 100 Smart Cities initiative.

In this context, SIG mentor for the Smart Livable Cities, Ronita Bardhan said that for a city to be smart it needs smart citizens to operate in that city.

“There are two aspects for smart cities to be a success in India – a) citizens should have the threshold motivation to react to the smart component and b) citizens should be facilitated to be motivated for maneuvering in a smart city,” she said.

She said the systems need to perform in two folds and they should be able to provide a platform for inducing motivation and also enabling the infrastructure.

The IIT GBF special interest group of Smart Livable Cities will ensure that the ideas, discussions, technologies and policies are realistic and that all elements are considered at an implementable scale.

The review committee, which includes an independent group of experts will look at innovation proposals from the IIT Bombay community specifically in the area of smart green buildings, mobility, water, solid waste, power, governance and healthcare, said Bardhan.

Concerning massive urbanisation she also stressed that India needs to find smarter ways to manage complexities, reduce expenses, increase efficiency and improve the quality of life.

One of the innovations Bardhan that will be showcased at GBF is in the area of smart green buildings. The main objective of a green building is to provide services for a comfortable, safe and healthy environment by minimizing energy consumption, environmental impact and conservation of water.

GBF is proposing to provide an open web based platform through which any developer during his expression of interest to build a green building will have to upload his building design with other relevant parameters. The platform is enabled to compute in real time and verify the veracity of the developer’s intention and thus completely do away with the five year waiting period.

Bardhan also said that participatory and inclusive forms of governance apart from the numerous opportunities for creativity should be provided to citizens for giving a better shape to a smart livable city.

We techrepreneurs put in our all in building a revolutionary product, and then as excited children want to show it to the world! People from our own IITB community are the biggest believers of our work and IIT GBF with its mix of alumni, investors and government officials is the perfect platform to showcase our products and get the traction they need, she added.