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The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs told the Rajya Sabha that under the AMRUT sub-scheme on GIS-based Master Plans, 461 AMRUT cities across 35 States/UTs have been onboarded, final geospatial databases prepared for 437 cities, draft GIS-based Master Plans for 404 cities and 292 Master Plans finalised.
Under AMRUT 2.0, the sub-scheme for Class-II towns with population 50,000-99,999 covers 875 towns; draft geospatial databases have been prepared for 399 towns of which 100 are finalised, and draft GIS-based Master Plans for 136 towns of which 93 are finalised.
'Formulation of GIS based Master Plan for AMRUT Cities' is a 100% centrally funded sub-scheme; the geo-databases have been integrated with the PM Gati Shakti National Master Plan, with data for 343 towns uploaded on its portal.
Mapping uses Very High Resolution Satellite imagery at 1:4000 scale under AMRUT, and both VHRS at 1:4000 and drone/UAV mapping at 1:1000 scale under AMRUT 2.0.
Capacity building has covered about 2,968 officials through 79 programmes under the AMRUT sub-scheme and about 2,648 officials through 34 programmes under AMRUT 2.0.
A master plan is the statutory document that fixes what may be built where in a city — land use zones, road alignments, densities and reservations for public purposes. Traditionally it was drawn on paper from surveys that were out of date before the plan was notified. A GIS-based master plan replaces that with a layered digital geospatial database in which existing land use, transport networks, water supply, sewerage, drainage, public amenities, environmentally sensitive areas and proposed infrastructure are each a queryable layer over an accurate base map. The base map itself comes from Very High Resolution Satellite imagery at 1:4000 scale, and under AMRUT 2.0 from drone or UAV mapping at 1:1000 — a scale fine enough to see individual plots. The Ministry is explicit about the limit of what this achieves. Enforcement of master plans and building bye-laws, and action against unauthorised construction, remain with State Governments, ULBs and Urban Development Authorities. A GIS plan reduces unauthorised construction only if the data is regularly updated and integrated with online building-permission and enforcement systems, and only if the local body actually acts. The map is a tool, not an enforcement authority.
Simple Analogy: GIS gives the municipal commissioner a live satellite view of every plot in the city. It does not give them the political will to demolish what should not be there.
Provide basic urban infrastructure — water supply, sewerage and septage, storm water drainage, non-motorised urban transport and green spaces
Key: Launched on 25 June 2015 covering 500 selected cities; the GIS-based Master Plan sub-scheme within it is 100% centrally funded and covers 461 Class-I cities
Make cities water secure and self-reliant through universal coverage of water supply and sewerage
Key: Launched on 1 October 2021 for 2021-22 to 2025-26; its GIS sub-scheme extends master planning down to 875 Class-II towns with population between 50,000 and 99,999
Provide the national technical framework for preparing urban and regional development plans
Key: Urban and Regional Development Plans Formulation and Implementation Guidelines issued by MoHUA; they encourage adoption of GIS-based planning tools and geospatial technologies for evidence-based urban planning and land management
Integrated multi-modal infrastructure planning on a common GIS platform
Key: The AMRUT geo-databases have been integrated with it, and data for 343 towns uploaded on its portal, so that urban master plans and national infrastructure planning read from the same map
Lists 18 functions to be devolved to Urban Local Bodies, of which the first is urban planning including town planning — the constitutional basis for the Ministry's statement that master plans are a ULB function and the Centre only supplements
Inserted Part IX-A (The Municipalities) and the Twelfth Schedule, and came into effect on 1 June 1993; it created the constitutional status of municipalities, ward committees, District Planning Committees and Metropolitan Planning Committees
The May 2016 standards govern VHRS imagery at 1:4000 scale under the AMRUT sub-scheme, and the October 2020 standards govern both VHRS at 1:4000 and drone/UAV mapping at 1:1000 under AMRUT 2.0
Master plans derive their statutory force from State legislation, which is why the Centre can fund the mapping but not enforce the plan
Articles 243ZD and 243ZE, inserted by the 74th Amendment, require District Planning Committees and Metropolitan Planning Committees to consolidate plans — bodies that remain unconstituted or dormant in many States, which is the deeper reason urban planning underperforms regardless of data quality
The AMRUT 2.0 sub-scheme's population band of 50,000-99,999 corresponds to Class-II towns in the census classification — the layer of urban India that has grown fastest and been planned least
The use of drone/UAV mapping at 1:1000 scale for urban master plans parallels the SVAMITVA scheme's drone survey of rural inhabited land — the same technology producing property-level cadastral accuracy on both sides of the rural-urban divide
Training under 2,968 and 2,648 officials respectively points to the shortage of qualified town planners in Indian ULBs that NITI Aayog has repeatedly flagged as the binding constraint on urban planning reform
GS Paper 2 > Governance > Devolution of Powers to Local Levels; GS Paper 3 > Infrastructure
General Awareness > Constitution and Government Schemes
Urban local governance, the 74th Amendment and AMRUT recur regularly in Prelims and GS2 Mains
The statutory document fixing land use, road alignments, densities and public reservations for a city, prepared by the ULB or Urban Development Authority under State town planning law
The schedule inserted by the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act, 1992 listing 18 functions to be devolved to municipalities, beginning with urban planning including town planning
The Urban and Regional Development Plans Formulation and Implementation Guidelines issued by MoHUA, the national technical framework for plan preparation
Very High Resolution Satellite imagery, used at 1:4000 scale to build the GIS base layers for master plans