Casa de la India promotes the cooperation between cities of India and Spain, acting as a bridge between both cultures and facilitating the ex-change of best practices in city management. It facilitated the Twinning Protocol between the cities of Valladolid and Ahmedabad, signed in July 2017 after a sustained period of cooperation in the fields of tourism and heritage management initiated in 2008 when a Friendship Protocol between both cities was signed to boost and expand the collaboration.
One of the milestones in the cooperation between Valladolid and Ahmedabad was the project "Cultural Heritage and Management Venture Lab in Ahmedabad, India", funded by the European Union through the EUROPAID office between 2013 and 2016. This project was led by Casa de la India and had four partners: University of Ahmedabad (Centre for Heritage Management), Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation, University of Valladolid and the City Council of Valladolid, in collaboration with several NGOs of Gujarat and Castile and Leon. The project included the presentation of a best practice manual in the field of heritage management, which described cases of success in this field from both Valladolid and Ahmedabad.
Since 2017, the cooperation between Valladolid and Ahmedabad is articulated, within the framework of the Twinning Protocol, through a Twinning Committee of which the director of Casa de la India is a member and which proposes an agenda of annual actions covering, among others, the following areas:
• Management of Architectural Heritage and Assets of Cultural Interest.
• Advice on public lighting systems based on renewable energies, including heritage and tourist routes (Smart Lighting and Smart Heritage).
• Electric mobility planning in the old city centres.
• The promotion of cities as tourist destinations.
• Visits of business delegations and experts to the twinned cities.
• Exchange of university students and secondary students.
• Presentation of music and dance shows.
