NEW DELHI: Move over Mumbai, Delhi is the place to be. As per a recent international survey conducted by Mercer Human Resource Consulting, the Capital is the best city to live in among the metros in India and can boast of the highest standard of living in the country.
While Delhi ranks at 148 (two places up from last year) in the two hundred and fifteen cities in the world that were surveyed by Mercer for their Worldwide Quality of Living Survey, Mumbai is at a poor 209. The third city to make it to the list is Chennai at 177.
Analysis of the cities was based on an evaluation of 39 criteria including political, social, economic and environmental factors. Other factors taken into consideration include personal safety and health, education, transport and other public services.
The survey points out Indian cities lose out a lot due to health and sanitation problems. Their scores are quite poor as compared to other international cities and this is proven with Mumbai getting a score of 38.2 as compared to New York as the base city with a score of 100.
"Indian cities score relatively poorly for health and sanitation. Most Indian cities are densely populated with poor waste removal and sewage systems. These issues, combined with increasing air pollution, contribute to their relatively low ratings,” said Slagin Parakatil, senior researcher, Mercer. He further added, “Overall Indian cities have also increased their quality of living. Yet, India still requires major investments in the areas of health, sanitation including waste removal, sewage and water portability among others.”
Meanwhile, the top scorers are Zurich at 108.1, Geneva (108), Vienna (107.7), Vancouver (107.7) and Auckland with 107.3 in the quality of living index. Interestingly, the rankings of the Asia pacific region remain literally static. The leader of the pack is Singapore at a rank of 34. Researchers at Mercer attribute this success to Singapore’s numerous expatriate facilities like restaurants, sports, leisure and their excellent transport system.
