Nurturing Neighbourhood Challenge: Significance, Benefits and Process details

The Ministry of Urban Affairs launched the Nurturing Neighbourhood challenge under the Smart City Mission in which 25 cities will be a part of the challenge out of 60 cities that submitted the proposal. The selected cities will get support and technical assistance for a period of 6 months.

The challenge was launched in November 2020 and is a three year initiative to increase the city space and make the cities childhood centric in their approach .The scheme simply put is to nurture the neighbourhood of the children by improving the space , childhood services and other amenities as a part of early childhood centric approach.

The scheme is an innovative initiative to provide quality of life to young children by Nurturing the neighbourhood in a way that increases the sensitivity towards children and promotes inclusive growth.

Need for Nurturing Neighbourhood challenge

Based on the census of 2011 around 37 million children under the age of five live in the urban areas across the country.Hence an early childhood centric approach wherein emphasis is made on city planning ,design and management is crucial for achieving the goals of sustainability ,heath and economic growth.

Organisations

The main partner organisations that are involved in the Nurturing Neighbourhood Challenge along with the Ministry of Housing and  Urban Affairs  are Bernard van Leer Foundation (BvLF) and World Resources Institute (WRI) India.

 Features / Process Details

The key features of this challenge is listed as follows -:

1. Three year initiative
2. 25 Indian cities 
3. 6 months support and technical assistance
4. Under the smart city Mission
5. Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs is the parent organisation
6. The scheme encompasses working with the cities and their partners to scale up ways to augment and improve the public space , childhood services, amenities, mobility, Neighbourhood planning and data management across the cities.
7. Inclusive development 
8. Access to health care services
9. Neighbourhood level projects 
10. Childhood centric approach .
11. The selected cities based on their proposal, commitment are given support – technical , capacity building to implement the solutions on ground to provide quality life to the young children of the city.

The main three steps of the challenge are 

1. Apply- 10 weeks window open for all cities across the country
2. Pilot- 6 months window wherein the selected cities receive the technical support to experiment and to pilot the children oriented solutions
3. Implement – 2 years window wherein the 10 finally selected cities will receive funds , technical assistance and support, capacity building and scaling to implement the solutions.

Significance of the Nurturing Neighbourhood challenge

 The significance of the smart City challenge are listed below as follows-:

1. Inclusive development / inclusiveness -The Nurturing Neighbourhood Challenge promotes Inclusive development in the cities . The aim is to improve the opportunities in the Urban areas especially to the vulnerable sections like the young children.
2. Sensitivity towards children- The Nurturing Neighbourhood challenge as part of its objective aims to work on neighbourhood planning with keeping in mind the  early childhood centric approach . A well defined city with basic health infrastructure  is crucial for early life hence proper urban planning has a major role to shape the early years of child life.
3. ITCN framework – The Nurturing Neighbourhood challenge is in accordance with the ITCN framework of the smart City Mission.ITCN stands for Infant,Toddler, Caregiver- Friendly Neighbourhood framework.Under ITCN a green, playful,safe, Inclusive and  Accessible Neighbourhood will be created to promote and provide quality life to young children.

• Safe – safe to walk and cycle while being distracted and daydreaming. A safe environment that respects privacy and is an area that is filled with trust of neighbours.
• Playful – filled with challenges, attention focusing and committed to culture and free from distractions
• Accessible – predictable and well communicated services;free from obstacles – virtual , physical; flexible 
• Inclusive – The neighbourhood fair to all not only the owners; listening and resolving to the needs of all the members ; transparent process ; thorough implementation of the process.
• Green – quiet ,bio – diverse, renewable, comfortable and future oriented environment.

Cities under the Nurturing Neighbourhood challenge 

Some of  cities that are a part of the Nurturing Neighbourhood challenge are listed below-:

1. Agartala 
2. Surat 
3. Salem
4. Bengaluru
5. Dharamshala
6. Erode
7. Coimbatore
8. Ujjain 
9. Vadodara
10. Hyderabad
11. Indore 
12. Kota
13. Kochi
14. Kohima
15. Ranchi
16. Rohtak
17. Rajkot
18. Thiruvananthapuram
19. Rourkela
20. Warangal

Cities which are selected will receive the following support from the government-:

• Technical assistance
• Capacity building
• Scale up support
• Trials and other pilot projects launched for a period of six months to find the best fit solution for promoting quality life .

Phase I of the challenge 

In this  phase of the challenge around 60+ cities came up the neighbourhood level childhood centric projects which were conceptualized.In the period of 7 months around 70 + projects on the lines of enhancing the public space , mobility and increased access to Toddlers, caregivers and infants .

Phase II of the challenge

In the Phase II of the challenge 10 cities were selected .

Conclusion 

The Nurturing Neighbourhood challenge was launched on 4 th November 2020 by the ministry of housing and urban affairs out of the 60+ applications and proposals 25 cities were selected like – kohima ,Rajkot , warangal ,Agra to develop a early childhood centric neighbourhood that is inclusive,safe ,green , playful and Accessible. The need for the challenge is to promote the quality of life of 37 million children under the age of five.