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The All India Institute of Local SelfGovernment (AIILSG) is organising the 6th Asian Cities Summit and Mayors’ Forum in New Delhi during April 57, 2023. The theme of the conference is ‘Urban Resilience and Inclusive Growth’.

Studies suggest that by 2050, 70 per cent of the global population will be living in urban centres, some in cities of more than 10 million people. The increasing urban population will need better services and infrastructure. Intending to build a better urban future, we have built a Forum where city mayors and senior officials from municipal corporations worldwide share their knowledge and learn from each other’s experiences. Cities also provide details of their contribution to achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and join hands to build a better urban future for coming generations. The COVID-19 has already underlined the importance of knowledge sharing and collaborations to deal with the evolving urban challenges. The Summit is a step in the right direction to forge long-term city to city collaborations of Indian and world cities. The event is one-of-its-kind in the region and focuses on bringing to the forefront the achievements of cities in policy and infra space. The event will be spread over a total of three days. It will consist of Keynote Addresses, Panel Discussions, and an exhibition of some of the most innovative ideas from the selected cities.

Earlier, AIILSG organised the 5th South Asian Cities Summit (SAC) supported by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA), Ministry of External Affairs, Government of Goa, and Goa Tourism Development Corporation. One hundred cities from South Asia participated as City Partners in the three-day Summit organised in Goa in March 2020. In the earlier editions of the Summit, Sumitra Mahajan, Former Speaker of Lok Sabha; Suresh Prabhu, Former Union Minister for Railways; Prakash Javadekar, Former Union Environment Minister; Manish Sisodia, Deputy Chief Minister, Delhi, and many national and international dignitaries have graced the Summit with their presence. In addition to this, a host of eminent urban experts from India and various countries worldwide have shared their insights on improving urban infrastructure and services during the earlier editions of the Summit. A series of sessions was organised during the 5th SAC summit on topics such as sustainable cities, mobility, water and cities, digital transformation of city management, urban sanitation, inclusive cities and South Asian Mayors’ Forum. In addition, parallel sessions were also organised paving the enabling environment towards Urban Sanitation Solutions, the Journey of Local Self Governments Associations from South Asia; Circular Economy; Electric Mobility, etc.

The last edition of SAC saw participation from dignitaries like Dr Pramod Sawant, Chief Minister, Goa; Uday Madkaikar, Mayor, Panaji; Hitesh Vaidya, Director, National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA); Dr Bernadia Irawati Tjandradewi, Secretary General, UCLG- ASPAC, Indonesia; Ranjit S Chavan, President, All India Institute of Local Self-Government (AIILSG); Rajiv Agarwal, Director General, AIILSG; Jerome Pons, Head of Cooperation, European Union; and Ravi Ranjan Guru, Deputy Director General, AIILSG. Hansa Patel, Executive Advisor, AIILSG and Debarshi Pandya, CFO, AIILSG welcomed the dignitaries and felicitated the guests with a set of books of Mahatma Gandhi. In the welcome address, Ranjit S Chavan said, “I am sure that the participating cities of South Asia must have come with new ideas and strategies to achieve SDGs as per their local needs and conditions. The discussion on different topics including the exchange of information and technology, updated systems and procedures, follow-up and removal of bottlenecks to achieve the target with the speedy process would definitely help each other to attain the final goals by 2030”.

United Cities and Local Governments—Asia Pacific (UCLGASPAC), World Bank, European Union, UN-Habitat, United Nations University (UNU), NALAS, CITYNET, J CLAIR, FSLGA-Sri Lanka, Municipal Association of Bangladesh (MAB), MUAN-Nepal, and several other distinguished national and international organisations have been our key partners all along.