Page 184 - ITU-T Focus Group Digital Financial Services – Executive Summary

1 Introduction

1.1 Background

Founded in 1411 AD as a walled city on banks of river Sabarmati, the city of Ahmedabad is now the seventh
th
largest metropolis in India. The textile industry revolution in 19 century brought a lot of prosperity to the
city, and marquee education institutions such as Indian Institute of Management, National Institute of
th
Design, Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology in 20 century brought in the knowledge capital
st
to propel the city to greater heights in the 21 century. The city attracted modern masters of architecture
such as Le Corbusier and Louis Kahn, who gave city a unique identity. The entrepreneurial nature of the locals
coupled with able leadership – has made the city an economic powerhouse – with city contributing about
14% of the total investments in all stock exchanges in India and 60% of the total productivity of the state.
Foreign and domestic investment in sectors such as pharmaceuticals, textiles, automobiles and information
technology have been driving the engine of growth in last decade, which is reflected in Forbes’ world raking
of #3 for fastest growing cities of the decade. The development of city and influx of people have only
accelerated over last three decades with the decadal population growth rising from 29% (in 1981) to 40% (in
2011), and the metropolis accommodating over 6.3 million people.

1.2 Challenge and response

The growing population in the city of Ahmedabad along with a relatively (compared to other Indian cities)
sparsely populated urban core has resulted in rapid urban sprawl. The administration, taking cognizance of
the issue, has developed multiple ring roads to enhance connectivity and regulate traffic. The city was among
the first in India to adopt a bus rapid transit system (BRTS) and has thus far implemented a BRTS corridor of
130 km, which boasts of daily ridership of 0.12 million passengers and fleet of 235 buses. The city bus
network, which serves as a feeder system for the BRTS, has a network on over 700 Km. This huge network of
transit system was managed by discrete IT systems which were nearing end of life, and were not well
equipped to address the challenges of operating a large fleet of buses to ensure operational efficiency.
Moreover, the fare collection systems across modes of transit lacked integration - resulting in revenue
leakages. The net result of revenue leakages and sub-optimal operations were - operating losses for the
entities running the city bus network, lack of predictability of bus journey, scarce availability of real time data
to plan for journeys, and lack of integration with informal public transit (shared cabs and auto-rickshaws)
resulting in reduced ridership emanating from lack of last mile connectivity.
The city administrators recognized the challenges faced by citizens and operating companies responsible for
public transit and constituted a “Smart Mobility” project to modernize the transit operations and provide
means seamless fare payment. An Integrated Transit Management System (ITMS) was envisaged to enable
gathering of transit data and intelligence in order to provide timely feedback to traffic managers and
commuters. The ITMS system was envisaged for real time monitoring of fleet of public transport buses and
hence enhance commuter satisfaction, reliability and punctuality of bus operations. Automated Fare
Collection System (AFCS) was aimed to automate its fare collection mechanism and remove leakages and
ease operations. Further fare collection mechanism (AFCS) of the transport ecosystem is envisaged to be
integrated with an open loop common card payment system (CCPS) to enable cashless transactions. A single
open loop card is proposed for mobility systems, municipal services, and any other government transactions
within the city. Further, open loop card can be used across any store or seller within the city that has a point
of sale terminal accepting cards. Administrators further acknowledged the need IT connectivity to enhance
physical connectivity across the city – and weaved in program to lay fiber optic cable along the BRTS corridor
to develop a digital highway which will be leveraged by ITMS, AFCS and CCPS systems.

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