Ecosport Discoveries - The Urban discovery entries & shortlisting

The campaign caught my attention due to the sheer realistic and practical touch which is showcasing the undiscovered places in your own city and being a foodie an actual explorer, thought to venture into the competition.
The road was not so simple and stars didn't favor me initially as my first 3 discoveries were rejected by Ford moderators but finally i entered my fourth and last entry as a local falooda+thick shake shop named "Sujata Mastani"

ENTRY - SUJATA MASTANI

And then started the tiring session of asking for votes, but was not satisfied with the quality of the picture i chose and was unable to edit it once it was approved, so was a tad bit disappointed and stopped asking for votes (lazy voice in me didn't let me !!) but then the underlying passion led me to ask my partner in crime a.k.a Priyanka Mishra to take part in the competition as she shares the same habits. So my first concern was to get few things in place and re-think our entries w.r.t to what ford was looking for the actual 'URBAN DISCOVERY'. 

• Quality of Photo
• Content
• Votes

So we took another shot and entered another food joint which we really love "Garden Vadapav Center" in Camp.

ENTRY - GARDEN VADA PAV CENTER 

Content:

"You can’t come to Maharshtra and go back without gorging on vadapavs! The fierce competition amongst the umpteen vadapav sellers may be as spicy as the red chutney in the pav, but little does that worry the Garden vadapav center outside JJ Garden in Camp, Pune.

The Ecosport cannot help me know the secret ingredient of the amazingly hot and tangy green chutney of the vadapav, but it can sure help me reach there in style. The chaotic streets in camp with little parking space might make it difficult but the convenience of being served just-fried crispy vadapavs while being seated in the Ecosport is a phenomenal package of a spicy flavour in a sweet dream!

The safe drive and the superior handling is a given for the SUV, but the superlative looks calls for not just the second but a third and fourth glance to my Ecosport. I’m sure I’ll be the first to get service the next time I stop by at the crowded JJ garden for this vada pav in an Ecosport!"

This time RJ Mantra came as a shining angel and shortlisted our entry in "you've got discovered" http://ecosportdiscoveries.co.in/2013/03/15/youve-just-got-discovered/ 

and followed by a sentence "These discoveries were truly unique and complete matched with the spirit of the campaign". This gave us the much needed boost and rejuvenation but it was again time for the much dreaded votes but a big shout out to our friends,  facebook &  google+ we did manage to get the much needed votes. We were on cloud nine and then came the much awaited shortlisting. 

We were literally shocked to see the results from mumbai, ludhiana and chennai, the most voted entries were out and even entries with few votes managed to get shortlisted. We were waiting for 10th April with bated breath for the shortlisted entries of Pune and guess what both of the entries got selected. (although one entry didn't make the cut).

So everyone who thinks the voting is rigged, think again as it turns out it was always very clear, voting only played a minor part in the judging and as evident on the website it clearly said "last date for voting and entry is 31st march" so it was obvious that one who would submit their entries on 31st march won't be able to gather so much votes and that's where my point is, these people must have gone by the content and photo quality and voting would be the last of the criteria for the final shortlisting.