Ease of Living Index: Ahmedabad Second-Best In Gujarat

Gujarat’s much-celebrated city, Ahmedabad has been featured as the second best in the state but stood at the 23^rd position out of a total 111 cities in the recently released ‘Ease of Living Index’. The textile hub of Surat is the most liveable city in Gujarat but ranked 19th in the country-wide list. Other cities that have fared poorly includes Vadodara (36), Rajkot (38), Gandhinagar (39), Diu (47) and Dahod (70).

The overall score has been divided into four livability standards- institutional, social, economic and physical. While the first two categories have 25 per cent weightage, economic and physical has 5 per cent and 45 per cent weightage respectively. Ahmedabad scored 13.93, 10.82, 2.28 and 17.24 respectively in each category.

Ahmedabad has scored highest in the state and has been ranked 7^th country-wide for governance. The city scored poorest in physical category such as public open spaces. The city also lagged behind in poor waste water management as well as housing and inclusiveness which stands for the percentage of slums covered through formal housing and percentage of slums covered with basic services. The city stood at 19^th position. Ahmedabad has been termed average for education, health and solid waste management. The overall score of the city is 44.28. Rajkot ranked highest in the state for employment opportunities whereas Gandhinagar scored maximum points in the state for open spaces.

Ahmedabad housing market

Being one of the prominent real estate destinations across India, Ahmedabad has scored poorly when it comes to formal housing and providing alternative housing to the slum-dwellers. Still recovering from the slump, according to Proptiger data, Ahmedabad has seen a decline of 72 per cent in new launches and inventory overhang of 46 months. While there has been marginal rise in the average sale price across the city,  sales dropped by almost 44 per cent in Q1 FY19.