How Agartala, Guwahati, Ranchi and Bhubaneswar Used the Smart Cities Mission for Citizens
India’s Smart Cities Mission (SCM) was launched on 25 June 2015 and formally closed on 31 March 2025. It picked 100 cities through a national challenge and funded them to upgrade services through area-based and pan-city projects. In a Lok Sabha reply on 6 August 2026, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) said that 7,790 of 8,064 projects (97%) were complete as of 31 March 2026, and that every one of the 100 cities now has an Integrated Command and Control Centre (ICCC).
This post looks at four cities in Eastern and Northeast India: Agartala, Guwahati, Ranchi and Bhubaneswar. For each one, we cover what was built, how it helps citizens and what is still unfinished. Project figures come from answers given in Parliament, and the city detail comes from reports we could open and confirm.
Agartala: An early mover in the North East
MoHUA’s Lok Sabha reply of 6 August 2026 lists Agartala with 77 SCM projects worth ₹808 crore, all of them completed, and ₹490 crore of central assistance claimed and used. That is a big step from November 2024, when the ministry’s reply to Lok Sabha Unstarred Question No. 1629 showed 71 of 76 projects done and five still running.
The city’s digital backbone stands out. In August 2024 Agartala Smart City opened its own data centre for its ICCC, which it says makes it the first smart city in India to do so. Global data-centre publication DatacenterDynamics reported that the ₹30 crore facility connects CCTV cameras, traffic signals, LED display boards and weather information boards through a 156 km optical-fibre network owned by Agartala Smart City. Before this, the ICCC was hosted in the state IT department’s data centre.
Agartala also features internationally. The 2023 UN-Habitat and MoHUA report on the mission names it, along with Bhubaneswar, among the 12 cities in CITIIS (City Investments to Innovate, Integrate and Sustain), a programme run jointly by France’s development agency AFD and the SCM. CITIIS projects focus on sustainable mobility and public open spaces.
“Agartala was one of the first cities in the North East to act, and setting up its command centre showed what a determined smaller city can achieve.”
— Sourish Dey, Director, Trisim Global Solutions, who was directly involved in setting up the integrated command and control centres for both Bhubaneswar and Agartala
Guwahati: A riverfront and city-wide CCTV, with delays
Guwahati was one of the first 20 winners announced in January 2016, placed 17th on the list published by The Hindu. Progress was slow at first. The UN-Habitat report lists Guwahati among the cities supported by the 2020 “Sister Cities” challenge, which paired cities to lift their performance over 100 days. In February 2024, Assam minister Ashok Singhal said the city had moved up from 97th of 100 when implementation began to 59th (ETV Bharat Assam). The August 2026 Lok Sabha reply now lists all 21 of Guwahati’s projects, worth ₹755 crore, as complete. In November 2024 the figure had been 19 of 21.
The project citizens notice most is the Brahmaputra riverfront. The Times of India reported in July 2025 that Guwahati Smart City Limited (GSCL) is building a 1.2 km stretch from DC Bungalow to Kacharighat at an estimated ₹69.85 crore. It includes a 15-metre boulevard, jogging and cycling tracks, children’s play areas, restrooms, CCTV and PA systems. The Panbazar segment opened on 20 January 2024. The project also drew criticism: about 40 mature trees were felled in Uzanbazar in 2023, and officials promised compensatory afforestation.
Public safety is GSCL’s other big focus. A ₹220 crore project aims to install 2,000 CCTV cameras across the city, with an ICCC planned at the Police Commissioner’s office in Khanapara. By mid-2025 it was about halfway done, with 100 cameras working and poles up at 650 locations. Overhead power lines and buried water pipelines run by other agencies slowed the work (Times of India, May 2025; The Sentinel, June 2025). We covered the city’s traffic systems earlier in Guwahati soon to be safer with deployment of ITMS.
Ranchi: Traffic enforcement and smart street lighting
Answering Lok Sabha Unstarred Question No. 1629 on 5 December 2024, Minister of State Tokhan Sahu said Ranchi Smart City Corporation Limited (RSCCL) “has completed all its 26 projects amounting to ₹1,847 crore”. The August 2026 reply shows the same. The UN-Habitat report also names Ranchi among the SCM cities that took up integrated greenfield development.
The ICCC is where Ranchi’s residents feel the change most directly. RSCCL has deployed 200 red-light violation detectors, 250 automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras, 30 speed violation detectors and 135 general surveillance cameras. City police planned more than 300 extra cameras for crime-prone lanes, on top of a network of about 1,100. Some cameras removed for flyover work were still waiting to be put back, and one resident told the paper the city “needs far more” (Times of India, January 2025).
RSCCL also lit two 22 km lanes with 1,300 sensor-based LED lights. They brighten in heavy traffic and dim when roads are quiet, which saves power while keeping commuters safe. L&T finished the installation by April 2024, and after a monitoring period the lights were handed to the state power utility JBVNL (Times of India, February 2025).
Bhubaneswar: The first-round topper
Bhubaneswar came first among the first 20 winners announced on 28 January 2016 (The Hindu), with 78.83 marks. Hours after the announcement, the municipal commissioner said reliable public transport would be the first priority. It had won 32% of the votes in citizen polls, and the plan was to link traffic lights through an intelligent city operations and management centre (The Indian Express, January 2016).
Ten years on, the August 2026 Lok Sabha reply lists 31 of Bhubaneswar’s 32 projects as complete (₹2,057 crore of ₹2,072 crore). The Odisha capital is the only one of these four cities with a project still open. The UN-Habitat report uses Bhubaneswar as its illustration of “area-based development” and highlights its pelican crossing signals as an example of attention to vulnerable road users. It also cites the city’s Odyssey Card as an example of a common smart payment card. Our earlier post Honeywell helps Bhubaneswar boost security with city-wide surveillance system covers the city’s surveillance roll-out.
“Having worked on Bhubaneswar’s command and control centre from its early days, I saw how holistic the approach was from the start in 2017. Active government involvement meant the ICCC was planned alongside transport, utilities and citizen services rather than bolted on later.”
— Sourish Dey, Director, Trisim Global Solutions
At a glance
| City | SCM projects (as on 31 Mar 2026) | Flagship work | Citizen benefit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agartala | 77 of 77 complete (₹808 cr) | Own ICCC data centre, 156 km city fibre network | CCTV, signals and public displays on one network |
| Guwahati | 21 of 21 complete (₹755 cr) | Brahmaputra riverfront; 2,000-camera CCTV project | Riverside public space; safer streets (CCTV still being rolled out in 2025) |
| Ranchi | 26 of 26 complete (₹1,847 cr) | ICCC traffic enforcement; sensor-based LED lanes | Safer roads, energy-efficient night lighting |
| Bhubaneswar | 31 of 32 complete (₹2,057 cr) | Area-based development; command centre; Odyssey Card | Pedestrian-friendly crossings, one card for city payments |
Source for project counts: Lok Sabha Unstarred Question No. 3075, 6 August 2026.
The challenges
The headline numbers look strong, but the reports also show real problems. Guwahati’s CCTV roll-out ran into utilities owned by other agencies. Its riverfront cost mature trees. Ranchi’s camera coverage still has gaps, according to police and residents. Bhubaneswar, the first-round topper, still had one project open in 2026.
The bigger question is what happens after the mission. MoHUA’s reply to Lok Sabha Starred Question No. 75 (23 July 2026) says that after the mission closed, the ministry asked the city companies running SCM to finish ongoing projects, prepare operations and maintenance plans for the assets, and keep ICCCs running as “city operating systems” (MoHUA Advisory No. 27, 10 June 2025).
What other cities can learn
- Build the digital backbone early. Agartala’s city-owned fibre and data centre put cameras, signals and displays on one network.
- Link the ICCC to enforcement and services. Ranchi’s cameras feed directly into traffic enforcement.
- Coordinate with utilities from day one. Guwahati’s delays came from power lines and water pipes owned by other agencies.
- Plan the hand-over. Ranchi’s lights moving to JBVNL shows that every asset needs a clear owner once the mission ends.
- Consult citizens on trade-offs. Bhubaneswar built its plan on citizen polls, while Guwahati’s tree felling shows the cost of skipping consultation.
For more on how command centres work in practice, read The Evolving Role of Control Rooms in Modern Cities and How Video Walls Are Transforming India’s Smart City Control Rooms.
Conclusion
The four cities took different routes. Agartala built a digital backbone, Guwahati combined a riverfront with city-wide surveillance, Ranchi focused on traffic enforcement and smart lighting, and Bhubaneswar used its first-round lead for area-based development. On paper, almost all their SCM projects are now complete. The real test is whether the ICCCs and other assets keep running and improving now that the mission has ended.
Trisim’s view: Trisim Global Solutions works on control rooms and city surveillance, and we see ICCCs as the backbone of these gains. Our Director, Sourish Dey, has hands-on experience setting up the command and control centres in Bhubaneswar and Agartala. If your city or campus is planning or upgrading a command centre, talk to us.
Sources
Parliamentary
- Lok Sabha, Unstarred Question No. 3075, “Completion Status of Projects under SCM”, answered 6 August 2026 by Shri Tokhan Sahu, Minister of State, Housing and Urban Affairs. Link
- Lok Sabha, Starred Question No. 75, “Inclusion of New Cities under SCM in Tamil Nadu”, answered 23 July 2026 by Shri Manohar Lal, Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs. Link
- Lok Sabha, Unstarred Question No. 1629, “Status of Projects under Smart Cities Mission”, answered 5 December 2024 by Shri Tokhan Sahu, Minister of State, Housing and Urban Affairs. Link
Government
- Press Information Bureau, “10 Years of Smart Cities Mission: 94% of projects completed, ₹1.64 lakh crore invested”, 24 June 2025. Link
Global
- UN-Habitat and MoHUA, “Smart Cities Mission, India: Localizing Sustainable Development Goals”, 2023. Link
- DatacenterDynamics (DCD), “Indian Smart City Agartala gets data center”, 14 August 2024. Link
Indian media
- The Hindu, “Govt. announces list of first 20 smart cities under ‘Smart Cities Mission'”, 28 January 2016. Link
- The Indian Express, “Smart Cities list topper: The road ahead for Odisha’s capital”, 30 January 2016. Link
- ETV Bharat Assam, “গুৱাহাটী স্মাৰ্ট চিটী প্ৰকল্পৰ ২৪ টা প্ৰকল্পৰ ১৯ টা প্ৰকল্পৰ কাম সম্পূৰ্ণ: অশোক সিংহল” (Assamese), 23 February 2024. Link
- Times of India, “City’s CCTV surveillance project nears halfway mark”, 27 May 2025. Link
- The Sentinel, “Guwahati’s smart CCTV surveillance project hits 50% milestone”, 3 June 2025. Link
- Times of India, “Brahmaputra riverfront project nears completion”, 2 July 2025. Link
- Times of India, “Another 300 CCTV cameras for crime-prone roads by March”, 20 January 2025. Link
- Times of India, “Ranchi Smart City gets sensor-based street lights”, 10 February 2025. Link