Despite its increasingly congested roads and burgeoning population, New Delhi, which has a per-capita income of around Rs 52,000, well over twice the national average, has come up trumps in a worldwide survey by respected human resource consulting firm Mercer. It says that New Delhi is the best city to live in among the metros of India.

It could all be relative, of course. Kolkata has not got its act together, Bangalore has had too much of a good thing called IT choking its colonial-era roads, high-rent Mumbai was always congested, and Chennai is just not happening for lifestyle or weather.

Mercer’s 215-city Quality of Living Survey – which primarily aims at advising global managers moving between countries and cities – revealed that New Delhi raised its rank by two places over last year, but the bad news is that it ranks 148 among global cities analysed on the basis of 39 criteria that include health, sanitation, recreation, consumer items, public services, schools, housing, freedom and other other criteria.