100 Smart Cities Ban Gaye?

100 cities across India would be transformed into “Smart Cities” under a dedicated mission, with a completion timeline originally set between 2019 and 2023.

The deadline was extended three times: to June 2023, then June 2024, then March 2025, when the mission was formally closed. By July 2024, 90% of the roughly 8,000 individual sanctioned projects (worth ₹1.44 lakh crore) were completed. That's genuinely substantial delivery. But by the mission's own final numbers in March 2025, only 18 of the 100 targeted cities had completed every project assigned to them. “100 Smart Cities” shipped as a large number of finished projects spread across 100 cities, not 100 finished smart cities.

“90% of the projects got done. 18% of the cities can say they're actually finished.”