Delhi, 21 January 2008: In a press interview India’s urban development minister M Ramachandran said that following a credit rating process 19 Indian cities received high enough scores to enable them to float municipal bonds. While none of the cities under scrutiny obtained triple-A ratings, four cities were given AAs, four others As and eleven received BBBs. A triple B is considered good enough to issue bonds. While the minister declined to name the cities until after a ministerial consultation process, he was more forthcoming in praising cities that have been on the forefront of recent urban reforms. He said that Vizag, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Kochi, Coimbatore and Rajkot were some of the cities which had undertaken more urban reforms in the last couple of years than their peers. Ramachandran also told India’s Economic Times that urban water supply projects were on the top of the list of projects scheduled to receive financial support from central government. “That’s where is the need and hence there will be more investment in this sector,” he stressed.