Hello,
@Keenan! Welcome to the forum!
So first, let's take the definition of a metropolitan city from the Constitution of India:
'Metropolitan area means an area having a population of ten lakhs or more, comprised in one or more districts and consisting of two or more municipalities or panchayats or other contiguous area, specified by the governor by public notification to be metropolitan area for the purposes of this part.'
According to this definition, a city has to fulfil the requirements mentioned in the clause in order to become a metropolitan area. Let us break down these requirements:
- A population of ten lakhs or more, which means about one million or more.
- The one million population can be at one or more districts.
- The city must have two or more municipalities or panchayats.
Sometimes, cities with populations of one million and above are referred to as the
Million Plus Cities. On the other hand, cities with above four million in populations are referred to as
Mega Cities.
Taking these into consideration, there are about 46 metropolitan cities in India. This number is based of the latest 2011 census. The number of metropolitan cities could have increased in the last few years. Out of these 46 metropolitan cities, 8 of them are considered as
Mega Cities. The remaining 38 are considered as
Million Plus Cities.
So first, here are the 8 Mega Cities in India:
- Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Kolkata & Surat
Then, here are the 38 Million Plus Cities in India:
- Pune, Jaipur, Lucknow, Kanpur, Nagpur, Visakhapatnam, Indore, Thane, Bhopal, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Patna, Vadodara, Ghaziabad, Ludhiana, Coimbatore, Agra, Madurai, Nashik, Vijayawada, Faridabad, Meerut, Rajkot, Kalyan-Dombivali, Vasai-Virar, Varanasi, Srinagar, Aurangabad, Dhanbad, Amritsar, Navi Mumbai, Allahabad, Ranchi, Howrah, Jabalpur, Gwalior, Jodhpur, Raipur & Kota
Together, these are the 46 Metropolitan Cities of India. These cities are listed according to the populations. So Mumbai, with a population of 12,442,373, is the first on the list. Then, Kota, with a population of 1,001,694, is last on the list.
In addition, Mumbai has 27 municipalities, Delhi has about 52 municipalities, Bangalore has 11 municipalities, Chennai has 21 municipalities, Hyderabad has 12 municipalities, Ahmedabad has 26 cities, Kolkata has 72 municipalities and Surat has 9 municipalities.
I hope this helps you.