A Sensible City is a precursor to be a Smart City……

Last week I participated in the eGov symposium at Tirupati, hosted by the Government of Andhra Pradesh. As part of the program, I listened to several speakers on the subject of ‘Smart City’, where the common theme was deployment of sensor-based technologies for predictive smarter solutions. Anyway, ‘Smart City’ is now a well-accepted jargon in India and more so through the recent selection of first 20 cities for investing into Smart City concept, by Ministry of Urban Development. Next day was Saturday and I visited Tirumala, a city on top of the hill, known as ‘Devasthanam’- abode of Lord Balaji; the most visited religious place in the world.

The visit to Tirumala city is an experience apart from ‘Darshan’ of Lord in the temple, that shows you how the city is kept spick and span with no spitting and smoking; how the transport and parking bays are managed reducing pollution; how the speed of vehicle is regulated both climbing up and down the hill; how the crowd is managed with amenities providing convenience and comfort to the visitors. Even the local citizens participate in voluntary services. The Trust (TTD) has deployed technology including online facility for several services including tickets, donations, and accommodation booking to tackle the volume and velocity of visitors. One can easily see through the underlying mission of the city, which is to be a sensible one where all economic, social and cultural activities converge into a single vision ‘Darshan’. Tirumala city is a ‘Sensible’ city more than a ‘Smart’ city, and thanks to the administration and governance of the TTD Trust. And that should be a lesson for the selected Smart Cities to endeavor to become sensible ones first before deployment of any IOT sensors and big data analytics.

Only one thing that pinched me personally is that too many VIPs and VVIPs in shorter queues. Tirumala should have only one VIP, i.e. Lord Balaji himself and rest others, whoever they may be, should be treated as ticket holders, maybe of different denominations and queues. I am sure that with the forward thinking TTD Trust, this will also change soon.