Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu on Tuesady announced the third list of 27 cities for financing under the Government flagship Smart City Mission.

Of the 27 cities, Maharshtra got maximum cities (Thane, Nashik, Nagpur, Kalyan Dombivali and Aurangabad), followed by Tamil Nadu (Madurai, Salem, Thanjavur and Vellore) and Karnataka ( Hubbali-Dharwad, Managaluru, Shivamogga and Tumkaru). Poll bound Uttar Pradesh got three cities included in the list ( Agra, Kanpur and Varanasi). Madhya Pradesh (Gwalior and Ujjain), Rajasthan (Kota and Ajmer) and Gujarat (Vadodara). Rourkela was the lone city from Odisha and Tirupati from Andhra Pradesh.

This list has also included two cities from North-East ( Kohima from Nagaland and Namchi from Sikkim). No city from West Bengal and Bihar found mention in the third list.

The government had selected first 20 cities in January this year and included next 13 cities in May this year. Today's announcement will take the total number of Smart Cities to Sixty. The remaining cities will be selected by January 17.
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The total investment in 27 cities that will be developed as “smart” is envisaged at about Rs 66,883 crore.

Smart cities are picked though a two-stage process. In the first stage, a state shortlists potential cities and send the names to the Centre. In the second round, these nominated cities compete with each other.

The Centre will give Rs 48,000 crore for five years for the programme. Each city will get Rs 100 crore per year. A matching fund of Rs 48,000 crore will have to be contributed by states from their internal resources/ market borrowing and through private sector.

Here is the list of the 27 cities on the basis of the score:

Amritsar (Punjab)
Kalyan (Maharashtra)
Ujjain (Madhya Pradesh)
Tirupati (Andhra Pradesh)
Nagpur (Maharashtra)
Mangalore (Karnataka)
Vellore (Tamil Nadu)
Thane (Maharashtra)
Gwalior (Madhya Pradesh)
Agra (UttarPradesh)
Nashik (Maharashtra)
Rourkela (Odisha)
Kanpur (UttarPradesh)
Madurai (Tamil Nadu)
Kota (Rajasthan)
Tumkur (Karnataka)
Thanjavur (Tamil Nadu)
Namchi (Sikkim)
Jalandhar (Punjab)
Shimoga (Karnataka)
Salem (Tamil Nadu)
Ajmer (Rajasthan)
Varanasi (UttarPradesh)
Kohima (Nagaland)
Hubli-Darvad (Karnataka)
Aurangabad (Maharashtra)
Vadodara (Gujarat)