The survey was started to encourage cities to move towards an outcome-based approach to urban planning and management. Its framework comprised four pillars—institutional, social, economic and physical—which are further broken down into 15 categories and 78 indicators. The minister said evaluation of cities was done on a 100-point scale with the institutional and social pillars carrying 25 points each, five points for the pillar on economic and 45 points for the physical pillar.

A ministry official said the cities submitted data on more than 50,000 points. Secondary audit of 10,000 documents, physical audit of 14,000 units and survey of more than 60,000 citizens were completed which led to finalization of the index.

The assessment standards, according to the government, are closely linked to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and will provide a strong impetus to India's effort for systematic tracking progress of the goals in the urban areas. Of the 17 SDG goals, eight are directly linked to India’s ease of living assessment framework.