Bhubaneshwar has topped the India Smart City Challenge, followed by Pune, Jaipur, Surat and Kochi. The five other cities to make the top 10 are Ahmedabad, Jabalpur, Visakhapatnam, Solapur and Davanagere. Overall, 20 cities have been selected. Other cities to make the top 20 list include Indore, NDMC, Coimbatore, Kakinada, Belagavi, Udaipur, Guwahati, Chennai, Ludhiana and Bhopal. Cities from the top 5 poorest states in the country, namely Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh are noticeably missing. Cities eliminated at this stage of the competition will have a chance to compete in the next round by upgrading their proposals and submitting them by 15th April. The shortlisted cities will now need to start implementing the plans as well as refining the proposal. The final winning cities are expected to be announced in March, and will receive a total investment of Rs 50,802 cr over five years from the Ministry of Urban Development and through public-private partnership to fully implement their proposals. For the current phase of the competition, a percentage score was assigned to each city based on how good their proposals were. Bhubaneshwar scored 78.83% while Pune followed with 77.42%. Each city to make the top 20 list scored above 50%. Parameters used to judge include cost effectiveness, citizen participation, feasibility and smartness of the proposal. However, it's not clear how these parameters were weighed. 98 shortlisted cities: In August, the Minister of Urban Development Venkaiah Naidu approved 98 cities of the initially submitted 100 cities, to participate…
