Ease of Living Index 2020: Hyderabad ranks 24th; Bengaluru tops list of best cities to live in

Also, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has ranked 17th in the Municipal Performance Index while Indore topped the list with a score of 66.08 followed by Surat and Bhopal.

The Ease of Living Index (EoLI) is an assessment tool that evaluates the quality of life and the impact of various initiatives for urban development. It provides a comprehensive understanding of participating cities across India based on the quality of life, the economic ability of a city, and its sustainability and resilience. The assessment also incorporates the residents' view on the services provided by the city administration through a Citizen Perception Survey.

Best cities to live in India

Bengaluru topped the list with a score of 66.70 followed by Pune (66.27) and Ahmedabad (64.87). Meanwhile, cities at the bottom of the list included Srinagar with a score of 42.95, Dhanbad (46.96), and Bareilly with a score of 47.73.

Also, Visakhapatnam was the top city from Andhra Pradesh and ranked 15th with a score of 57.28 score.

The rankings under Ease of Living Index 2020 were announced for cities with a population of more than a million and cities with less than a million people. A total of 111 cities participated in the assessment exercise that was conducted in 2020.

Bengaluru emerged as the top performer in the Million+ category, followed by Pune, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Surat, Navi Mumbai, Coimbatore, Vadodara, Indore, and Greater Mumbai. In the Less than Million category, Shimla was ranked the highest in ease of living, followed by Bhubaneshwar, Silvassa, Kakinada, Salem, Vellore, Gandhinagar, Gurugram, Davangere, and Tiruchirappalli.

The Municipal Performance Index (MPI) examined the sectoral performance of 111 municipalities across five verticals which comprise 20 sectors and 100 indicators in all totality. The five verticals under MPI are services, finance, policy, technology, and governance.

"It seeks to simplify and evaluate the complexities in local governance practice and promote the ethos of transparency and accountability," said Hardeep Singh Puri, the Union minister of state housing and urban affairs.

He also added that both the indices represent an attempt to gauge the performance of cities across India on various parameters of urban living. The Ease of Living Index encapsulates the outcome indicators while the Municipal Performance Index captures the enabling input parameters, he said.

The government added that learnings gathered from these indices can help the government identify gaps, tap into potential opportunities, and increase efficiency in local governance to improve the lives of citizens and fulfill broader development outcomes. The framework for these assessments was prepared by MoHUA with the Institute for Competitiveness as the knowledge partner.